My school is in the heart of Silicon Valley, and I am shocked by how little both teachers and students know about technology’s usefulness in the journalism world. Some are fine, most are not.

The one thing I don’t think will ever really happen, except at the most competitive schools, is the interview process. Look, schools still gotta make money. And there will always be those that wander and not know what they want to do. But they pay tuition.

Those without the real drive for journalism will graduate with a near-useless degree. The real world will sort out the flotsam from the jetsam. For now, the rest of us have to put up with them on our staffs and make it work. It’s their learning experience, and you gotta respect that.

I’m with you on everything but the interview process. Don’t forget that many people (like myself) go into college not really knowing what they want to do. It’s sort of hard to commit to such a rigorous review process before deciding if journalism is what you want to study.

I hear what you’re saying – we need quality people. But… I’d be a bigger fan of weeding out the deadwood. Make the program rigorous. Demand internships, demand experience. Demand an online brand. etc…

I’m in the photo program at Syracuse University, and I can tell you that there are fellow seniors of mine that don’t know how to light. They simply have no concept of how to use anything but natural light. Studios, but more importantly, flash and multiple flash *scares* them.

This is the sort of thing that represents a failure in the education system. Syracuse’s Newhouse school is supposed to represent the top of the field in jschools and we’ve only got one class that focuses on video in the photo program. Ridiculous.

On grades: you’re right. Grades are a poor way of evaluating work. It goes to the lack of understanding of the way the internet works. There is no final draft.

A blog post is the start of a conversation. The traditional newspaper article won’t be used in just a few years, teach us what to do about that. Further… we need to be learning about crowdsourcing instead of sourcing articles. The former is important, but it’s now a specialized skill, not the nature of the trade. Meaning that the ‘final’ product is constantly evolving; grades are too final. We need a *program,* not just classes that go semester to semester. I’m thinking about the way our architecture school works – they’ve got a 5 year, intensive program. Professors all work together to ensure that the program is an *experience,* not just a compilation of skills and thoughts gleaned from different profs in different classes.

To your point about old dogs: We’re kind of screwed. Ultimately what we need is a bunch of people who are academics who spend their whole time studying the trends and the future. It’s not longer relevant to have a grizzled old veteran who’s been around the newsroom for 30 years teaching. They’re already 3 generations out of date.

We need profs. who have industry contacts, and who have seen the ‘real world,’ but who spend their whole day reading blogs, tweeting, talking to other forward thinkers, holding conferences, shooting video, running a website, making money online, etc.

In many respects, the job of the jschool is much harder now. Students need to be taught how to do good journalism, but:
a) the definition of journalism has changed… this still has to be recognized by the industry/jschools
b) journalism isn’t all they have to teach anymore. They’ve got to address the internet as well. That’s a whole lot more learning crammed into the same amount of time

And perhaps the biggest impediment: many of the students know the internet intrinsically. Jschool professors don’t have that advantage. In many cases, the students can teach the teachers.

BTW… I wrote a blog post that touches on some of these points (though from a different angle) a little while ago:
http://byjoeybaker.com/blog/2008/10/30/yes-it-is-our-fault/

Wow, I’m long-winded. :)