I’m very excited to be teaching a new course at Georgetown University this summer called Web Development for Media, which begins tonight in Clarendon. The class includes 10 journalism and five public relations graduate students in the School of Continuing Studies.
The course assumes no prior knowledge of code or web development and will be akin to a practical survey class — intended to guide students through understanding and using some key tools. With fundamental understanding and hands-on practice, they’ll be able to dive deeper and teach themselves more after the 12 weeks. Here’s the official description:
Merely using the web and digital tools is no longer enough for today’s media professionals. Journalists and communicators alike need to have a strong foundational and practical understanding of how websites and applications are built and how to troubleshoot when problems arise. This class does not aim to make you hard-core coders or require any web development experience, but we do want you to come away with some coding skills. You’ll also be able to more effectively collaborate with web developers and continue learning on your own.
Students will learn about the various phases of web development and the fundamental technologies used to code and design web pages by diving into HTML and CSS, plus some basic JavaScript, jQuery and PHP. Students set up their own self-hosted website using WordPress. Readings, guest speakers and hands-on learning activities and assignments will be the basis for instruction.
Follow along on the course site, check out the syllabus and let me know in the comments below what you think.
Last year I led a more general discussion about impact, which Andrew Spittle expertly documented in his notes. Springboarding from that, Wendy Warren and I did a follow-up #BCNI12 session to dive into specific, qualitative possible news metrics for success.
The thinking and conversations about impact have grown and evolved in the past year, such as with a conversation about impact at #ONA12. With this progress, we’re going to take a much more hands-on approach at the unconference this time, as Erika wrote in her preview post:
It’s pretty easy for the conversations around impact to go in circles, but the aim is for this discussion to be more focused. Greg suggested an “impact-a-thon” format where folks share case studies, discuss them in small groups, and then report back on the findings.
Do you have any case studies of stories you’ve worked on? Analytics and/or anecdotes to share of impact of the stories? Think back to those awards application cover letters, what did you describe for why your story should be honored?
The session, rather than theory, will focus on implementation. How have organizations monitored impact, and what are some specific examples of things they can do for future stories? We look forward to an insightful, action-oriented discussion, and want your help in designing the session. Please email the Google Group, share your thoughts, and join us Saturday morning.
Brian will share his experiences thus far exploring impact measurement as an Open Newsfellow at The New York Times:
In preparation for the discussion, I’m hoping to get your thoughts and concerns about impact measurement (read up here) – what have we done right so far and what’s missing from the conversation?
I participated in an SPJ region 2 conference panel in Norfolk, Va. this past Saturday. The topic: how a few recent graduates got their first jobs in journalism. Tweets from the session appear below, enjoy!
