Syllabus

About the course

COMM 111 is a required writing course for all communication majors and minors at BYU-Idaho. Many English majors and communication minors and cluster students take this class as well. It is designed to introduce you to news writing and reporting, research and feature writing, skills vital to success in most areas of journalism and mass communication. This course is designed to help you develop a clear, concise writing style and a dedication to thorough, accurate reporting. It will also teach sensitivity to the audience’s need and interests.

Assignments in COMM 111 will require that you gather, analyze and organize journalistic information for presentation to a general audience on a timely basis. The skills you learn will serve you well in both the print and digital media and should give you a solid basis for broadcast, public relations and advertising writing as well.

Course outcomes

Write effectively for mass audiences using approved journalistic and public relations styles and customs.
Produce clear, concise, and specific writing based on accurate research and reporting.
Competently edit documents based on Associated Press Style and other composition standards.
Effectively communicate with diverse audiences using new technologies.
Demonstrate a knowledge of current local, national and international events.
Increase ability to handle legal, ethical and moral issues in mass media sensitively.

Prerequisites

To register for COMM 111, you should be able to keyboard at least 35 words per minute. You should also have good skills in grammar, spelling, punctuation and usage. Usually a score of 20 or higher on the English portion of the ACT is evidence of adequate preparation to take this course. If you are missing any of these prerequisites, you should consider dropping the course until such skills can be improved.

Textbooks, materials and other reading

This online course does not use a standard textbook. Students are strongly encouraged to get the Associated Press Stylebook (https://www.apstylebook.com/) for use with the course (available online or may be checked out of a local library). Students will be required to read material online, including instructional material and online newspapers to keep up with the news. Other readings are embedded in the course.

Compare prices for your textbooks through the University Store Price Comparison site. They will show you all of the options from the University Store plus several online options to help you find the best price.

Your Responsibilities

Keep track of the news. Today’s professional must be aware of what is happening locally and nationally and how that news is reported to the public. Therefore, you should make it a daily habit to read online newspapers and other news sites.

Exercise good time management skills. A key to success with an online course is efficient time management. Do not procrastinate assignments. Do not try to take short cuts.

Keep copies of all your work. This protects us both if a paper is lost. I suggest you keep a copy on your hard drive and on a flash drive.

Create original work. All assignments you turn in must be work performed for this course. Assignments created for another course or another activity on campus cannot be used to fulfill assignments in this course. It is not honest for you to have a spouse or friend log on to your classes or complete any assignments in your behalf.

Plagiarism

Please read the following statement on plagiarism. This is a serious issue that many students don’t fully understand. You will be accountable for the information presented in this link: http://www.byui.edu/student-honor-office/ces-honor-code/academic-honesty/plagiarism

If you are caught plagiarizing all or part of an assignment – including not referencing a source correctly or not including appropriate quotation marks – you will be given a zero on the assignment and your name may be submitted to the Student Honor Office office. Please let your instructor know if you have any questions about what constitutes plagiarism.

Deadlines and Late Work

Late work. Communication careers work in an environment of constant deadlines. We’ll do the same. Therefore, I do not accept late work. All of your assignments are provided for you at the beginning of the semester with additional details and announcements updated weekly. Assignments should come as no surprise. Log on early in the week to plan accordingly (the new lessons open Saturday mornings).

Mulligan policy: Because this is an online class, I understand that technical difficulties will occur. Because of that, I will give you ONE mulligan that will give you an additional 24 hours for ONE assignment. This does not apply for discussions and group work since it is essential that class members pull their weight in a timely fashion. Let me know as soon as possible what the issue is. If you don’t use it, I will add 20 extra credit points to your grade at the end of the semester.

Grading

The following is an approximate guide. Exact point values may change as the course progresses.

Weekly Assignments	625
Other Assignments	1000
News Summaries	200
Teach One Another Activities	405
Final Project (Representative Profile)	810
Final Exam	100
Total Points	3140

Grading scale:

A = 93 – 100 %

A- = 90 – 92

B+ = 87 – 89

B = 83 – 86

B- = 80 – 82

C+ = 77 –79

C = 73 – 76

C- = 70 – 72

D+ = 67 – 69

D = 64 – 66

D- = 60 – 63

F = 0 – 59

Weekly ponder/prove assignments: These will give you a chance to practice the concepts learned in the current week’s lesson. Each is due Friday at 9 PM (MT). Edit your work carefully before sending it. Mechanical writing errors — such as spelling, punctuation, sentence structure or usage — will significantly hurt your grade. The spelling of names is especially important.

Ponder/prove activities: These will vary from week to week. Some will include online exercises from the Poynter Institute. Others will be smaller learning activities.

Weekly news summaries: Each week you are expected to be well informed on current events by reading or watching the news from major outlets. You will submit a short summary of five major news stories each week.

The Representative Profile: Details on this assignment will be given on a separate handout. It will be the biggest, and hopefully the best, project you will complete for this class.

Final exam: The final exam will include questions from reading assignments and learning activities during the semester. It will be administered online at the conclusion of the class.

Discussion board: You are encouraged to be proactive and thoughtful in the discussion board. Participating in discussions makes the class more interesting, increases your learning and helps you retain the concepts being taught. Be sure to submit at least 150 words per week to the discussion board in your own post and to respond to at least three of your classmates’ posts.

Bonus points: At the end of the course, the instructor may elect to give up to 20 bonus points for consistent, thoughtful online discussion and proactive group work. To earn these points, try to give thoughtful, mature insights in discussions. Take leadership roles in online learning groups.

Grading of writing assignments

In general, the following scale (including plus and minus) will apply to all work submitted:

A – virtually ready for publication

B – with editing and minor changes, the work would be publishable

C – satisfactory, but requires changes and/or additional information

D – several changes needed; fundamental problems with writing and/or editing

F – assignment was late or unacceptable because of factual/writing/reporting errors

Course schedule

All activities/assignments must be finished by Friday night unless otherwise noted in the course.

Lesson 01: Course Introduction (first partial week)

Course Pre-test

Topic 01: Introduction to the course

Topic 02: Introduction to the Rep. Profile

Lesson 02: Media writing basics

Topic 01: How journalists determine what news is

Topic 02: Ten principles of clear statement

Topic 03: Writing clear, concise sentences

Lesson 03: Rudiments

Topic 01: What is news/what makes news

Topic 02: Verifying facts

Topic 03: Building a strong foundation for media writing

Lesson 04: Hard News

Topic 01: The summary lead

Topic 02: Inverted pyramid structure

Topic 03: The hourglass organization

Lesson 05: Research/Using Quotes

Topic 01: Gathering facts from written/online sources

Topic 02: Quotations, attribution

Topic 03: Punctuating quotes

Lesson 06: Soft News

Topic 01: Hard news vs. soft news

Topic 02: Analyzing a Pulitzer Prize-winning feature

Topic 03: Understand soft (special) news leads

Lesson 07: Interviewing / Speeches

Topic 01: Preparing for the interview

Topic 02: Interviewing

Topic 03: Pitfalls/writing the interview story

Lesson 08: Math for Journalists

Topic 01: Accurate, efficient arithmetic

Topic 02: Percentages

Topic 03: Means, medians and modes

Lesson 09: Disaster / Police / Crime

Topic 01: The challenge of disasters, accidents, crime stories

Topic 02: Understanding protocol

Topic 03: Crime terminology

Lesson 10: Broadcast

Topic 01: How writing for broadcast is different

Topic 02: Broadcast vs. print news delivery

Topic 03: Writing broadcast leads

Lesson 11: Broadcast II

Topic 01: Broadcast project

Lesson 12: Public Relations

Topic 01: Reporter vs. PR worker

Topic 02: Advocacy journalism in America

Topic 03: Writing the news release

Lesson 13: Law / Ethics

Course Post-test

Topic 01: Defamation, copyright, invasion of privacy

Topic 02: Media ethics

Topic 03: Ethics case study

Lesson 14: Course Conclusion

Final test!