Test Story #3 -- An Overview

Seems like all the video stuff made you a bit rusty on your writing. Let's go over some patterns I saw that I feel can be improved upon:

The news isn't that things were discussed; it's what was done or not done. Too many ledes or section starts defaulted to things were discussed. That's not the news, right?

This was a lede that went in that direction:

The Happyland County Commission met yesterday afternoon, addressing several items within the county, both economic and social.

The problem here is that the news isn't that the commission addressed items; it's what the items were that were addressed. From this lede, you don't know if they gave out ribbons to old ladies or declared war on Russia. It's too vague. This next lede was better in that regard:

The Happyland County Commission met yesterday afternoon to discuss a new condominium development, purchasing pistols, their salary, and to honor two girls who saved a child from the water.

You do identify what the issues were, but it still falls short of ultimate outcome and end result; that being what actions they took regarding these issues: they approved a new condominium development, considered new gun restrictions, rejected increasing their salaries. You did note that they honored the girls.

Plus, it wasn't necessary that you include every element in your lede. A big part of journalism is deciding what is most newsworthy, and ranking that news accordingly (or even excluding things if you feel the newsworthiness was limited or simply not there).

This lede zeroed in on a single topic:

The Happyland County Commission met today and approved plans for a luxury condominium development on Elkhart Lake.

And that's fine. I'm not saying the development was necessarily the lede item; I think valid arguments could be made for any of the items being the most interesting, relevant and/or useful. Readers don't need us to summarize a whole meeting; they could probably Google an agenda themselves. What they need journalists for is to make sense of the news and tell them what matters most.

So don't be afraid to make decisions, based on the evidence and what may impact or interest readers the most.

One lede took ultimate outcome beyond the meeting. Remember the gun restriction decision was pushed to the next meeting? Well, this was one of your ledes:

The Happyland County Commission promised to consider a proposal requesting a three-day wait before a pistol, could be bought, after Sheriff Gus DiCesare suggested it at yesterday's commission meeting.

This is what I call a forward-looking lede; one that goes beyond what happened at an event, and is centered in what that means going forward, or what action is next as a result. When we talk about ultimate outcome, the outcome isn't that the board talked about it; it's that the board will talk about it some more. That's the latest and newest news.

Rank items based on importance, not sequence. Many of you ranked items in the order in which they were discussed. If that was a coincidence, that's okay. But in covering public meetings you should rank items based on what is most interesting/relevant/useful to your readers.

So, for a meeting story the order should be the most important topic, followed by the next most important, then the third, and so on. It should not be based on what was discussed first, then second, then third.

Label transitions to subsections. When ending reporting on one item and beginning another item, use transitional tags at the start of a subsection lede like, "In other business," or "Also at the meeting," so readers can see the transition point clearly.

Subsections should start with a lede. Many would start a subsection with something like, the commission discussed this-and-that, and then end the subsection with, the commission approved this-and-that.

A subsection should almost be like a mini-story in that the subsection -- like a single story -- should be topped by ultimate outcome. So in a subsection, you should be starting with, in other business, the commission approved this-and-that, and then offer the discussion as background.

Translate technical terms. Like, what is Planned Unit Development rezoning? Do you know? If not, how would you expect readers to know? If you do know, is there an easier way to describe what it means to rezone form agricultural to PUD? One of you did do that, by simply noting the board "plans to rezone the land to allow for construction" of condos on traditional farmland?

Fact-checking includes checking for AP Style. I don't still have to remind you of that, do I?

So, while on first reference you have a name and title (King Omar Sofradzija) on second reference you drop the first name AND the title (just, Sofradzija).

And punctuation still goes INSIDE the quote (like "this," and "this.") and NOT outside (it's wrong to do "this", or "this".)

Don't freak out. Oddly enough, looking at blog posts from the past two semesters after the third out-of-class story, those classes had the EXACT SAME PROBLEMS with this assignment. Literally. I just had to cut-and-paste most problem areas and update the exact examples with your work.

BTW, the last class I taught had the best overall grades of any class I taught. So if this class follows suit, this exercise can be put under the category of lessons successfully learned.