Word skill means?
In most cases, journalists use the same skills to cover education that they use for any other beat or assignment, and we can assume anyone hired for professional work will have them. But there are some skills that are either peculiar to education or so essential to covering schools that they are worth singling out.
Education reporters need to be able to:
1.Use computer spreadsheet and database programs.
State department, school district and university and college data now typically are available on computer spreadsheets, often online. News organizations now routinely use spreadsheet and database programs to sort, summarize, analyze and publish test scores, dropout rates and other information on the morning after release day.
2.Read a budget
At every level of education - the district, university or state - education writers must be able to read and decipher budgets, spotting trends, gaps or aberrations in the intake and outflow of money for schools. One useful way of analyzing a budget is to look at the relationship between money and quality. Classroom quality is surely affected
3.Interview students
This is a skill that comes with practice. Generally, reporters will find they will get nowhere with students, particularly young children, unless they take time to make them feel at ease and ask open-ended questions. We say more under ethics about how to interview students about sensitive issues.
4.Understand school politics
Schools are political organizations as well as learning institutions. School board members, teacher unions and administrators all engage in political tugs and pulls for control and power. So reporters need to be skillful in detecting when school initiatives are launched more for political rather than educational ends.
5.Cultivate extensive sources
Perhaps more than many beats, education writers need to have a wide variety of sources available to them to cover the broad range of topics and constituencies that fall within their beat's expansive borders. They should, for example, be able to quickly call on students, parents, teachers, professors, administrators, board members, business and political leaders and ordinary people in the community to comment on topics as diverse as making condoms available in school health clinics, methods of teaching math or the reasons college tuition outpaces inflation. Reporters also need to be able to find expert sources, often quickly, on a vast range of topics that affect schools and universities, such as school law, construction, finance, textbooks or governance.
6.Size up a school
Reporters need to be able to assess the quality of schools quickly, but with care, much as a home inspector determines whether a house stands on a solid foundation and is free of dry rot. Reporters need to gauge whether students are orderly and engaged in their work, teachers are focused on teaching, and administrators articulate clear goals. They should know how to spot signs of school quality, such as the merits of student work posted on hallway and classroom walls. They also must know when, where and how to check their subjective judgments against more objective measures such as test scores, attendance, teacher turnover and other indicators that reflect school value. News reports on school quality can profoundly affect the reputation of schools, so it is of course crucial that reporters get it right. The stakes are high.
In most cases, journalists use the same skills to cover education that they use for any other beat or assignment, and we can assume anyone hired for professional work will have them. But there are some skills that are either peculiar to education or so essential to covering schools that they are worth singling out.
Education reporters need to be able to:
1.Use computer spreadsheet and database programs.
State department, school district and university and college data now typically are available on computer spreadsheets, often online. News organizations now routinely use spreadsheet and database programs to sort, summarize, analyze and publish test scores, dropout rates and other information on the morning after release day.
2.Read a budget
At every level of education - the district, university or state - education writers must be able to read and decipher budgets, spotting trends, gaps or aberrations in the intake and outflow of money for schools. One useful way of analyzing a budget is to look at the relationship between money and quality. Classroom quality is surely affected
3.Interview students
This is a skill that comes with practice. Generally, reporters will find they will get nowhere with students, particularly young children, unless they take time to make them feel at ease and ask open-ended questions. We say more under ethics about how to interview students about sensitive issues.
4.Understand school politics
Schools are political organizations as well as learning institutions. School board members, teacher unions and administrators all engage in political tugs and pulls for control and power. So reporters need to be skillful in detecting when school initiatives are launched more for political rather than educational ends.
5.Cultivate extensive sources
Perhaps more than many beats, education writers need to have a wide variety of sources available to them to cover the broad range of topics and constituencies that fall within their beat's expansive borders. They should, for example, be able to quickly call on students, parents, teachers, professors, administrators, board members, business and political leaders and ordinary people in the community to comment on topics as diverse as making condoms available in school health clinics, methods of teaching math or the reasons college tuition outpaces inflation. Reporters also need to be able to find expert sources, often quickly, on a vast range of topics that affect schools and universities, such as school law, construction, finance, textbooks or governance.
6.Size up a school
Reporters need to be able to assess the quality of schools quickly, but with care, much as a home inspector determines whether a house stands on a solid foundation and is free of dry rot. Reporters need to gauge whether students are orderly and engaged in their work, teachers are focused on teaching, and administrators articulate clear goals. They should know how to spot signs of school quality, such as the merits of student work posted on hallway and classroom walls. They also must know when, where and how to check their subjective judgments against more objective measures such as test scores, attendance, teacher turnover and other indicators that reflect school value. News reports on school quality can profoundly affect the reputation of schools, so it is of course crucial that reporters get it right. The stakes are high.
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