An examination of Dorothy Day's role as chief journalist, editor, and publisher of "The Catholic Worker," the ideological monthly she cofounded in 1933, reveals that she was the final authority within the organization of the newspaper. Deeply committed to proselytizing for her cause, the Catholic Worker Movement, Day still simultaneously…

Research shows that reporters often seek out the most available news sources rather than those who have the most expertise, that journalists tend to focus on specific events rather than the context in which they occur, and that news stories are presented as stylized social constructs rather than as factual accounts of what happened. A study…

A study examined the potential for development of a traffic accident-reporting form in the Canadian daily press that strengthens concern for road safety in the general population and enhances knowledge, attitudes, and behavior leading to greater safety. The investigation was conducted on three levels: a content analysis, a readership analysis, and…

Teachers actively engaged in responding to their students' written narratives should be mindful of the many influences on their students' writing, including the abuses of the language by government bureaucracies and the media. Examples of these abuses are (1) the lack of density and direction or purpose in bureaucratic writing, (2) the disjointed,…

This public relations handbook for staff members of early childhood organizations identifies elements of the communications process and provides tips on conducting effective publicity activities. News (hard breaking news and news with a human interest slant) is distinguished from trivia and examples are given of each. Guidelines for arranging…

This monograph describes successful publicity practices in adult education that can be adapted to fit individual promotional plans for communication with the community. The introduction explains the importance of good public relations to an adult education program. In section 1, publicity and promotion, the various ways of publicizing information…

To determine whether differing attitudes toward, and the utilization of, the daily newspaper are related to the variable of age, 481 persons responded to a questionnaire designed to measure their attitudes and opinions about mass media in general and their evaluations of newspaper content in particular. The findings revealed the following…

One hundred eleven of 125 schools and departments of journalism surveyed replied to a questionnaire about news/editorial subject areas in which courses had been dropped or added during the past three years and about changes in emphasis in existing courses during the same period. Among the many detailed findings was that the seven subject areas in…

The reason for creating the Task for Reporting, Interviewing, and Observing (TRIO) was to make selective perception and metaphoric transformation come alive for students. This paper includes the experiences in designing, implementing, and trying out the exercise, a description of the exercise, a summary of the participants' play, and suggestions…

This volume provides a broad introduction to the roles of the four principal media of mass communications--the newspaper, the magazine, radio, and television--and presents the fundamentals of writing for each of these media. Each medium is examined with respect to its unique position and influence in American society and is compared, for editorial…

Discusses the need for courses about community journalism in college journalism programs. Provides a composite course outline from those supplied by 30 schools or departments of journalism, with suggestions about assignments, projects, discussion topics, and textbooks. (RL)

Points out that writing errors of journalism students can result from faulty thought patterns involving thinking in sentence fragments, personifying objects, using bureaucratic abstractions, and condensing complex ideas; examines ways of dealing with sentence fragments and personification. (First of a two-part article.) (GT)

Tells how the author acquaints journalism students with the problems of poverty by having them develop profiles of poverty groups for a course in public affairs reporting. (RL)

Urges everyone in journalism or journalism education to emphasize the use of "sexless" plural pronouns where pertinent and possible. (RL)

Urges college journalism instructors to contribute to the training of high school students by learning about the professional press, sharing their knowledge with high school teachers, and setting up one-day workshops for high school students. (GW)