Pass the Peas?

"I tell students all the time, it is called the news business. You are trying to get an audience.  You can't just serve vegetables.  You have to broadly create a program that people will watch.  The balance you create is the balance you create." - Aaron Brown, former CNN anchor who teaches at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at ASU, as reported by Bill Goodykoontz in today's Arizona Republic.

"Give people a little pizazz to get them to eat their vegetables," Dylan Smith.

I picked up The Arizona Republic this morning to read while drinking my coffee and because they are free in the Sheraton lobby. Aaron Sorkin's latest TV series is piloting tonight on HBO.  It's called "The Newsroom" and Goodykoontz wrote an insightful review.  He talks about the idealized version of news reporting that you'll see in "The Newsroom," and how typical of Sorkin that is, and how happy it will likely make people in the journalism field.

Check it out - it was an interesting and timely read. http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/ae/articles/2012/06/12/20120612aaron-sorkins-newsroom-shines-light-journalism.html

There are three things that strike me as interesting in this personal instance of news reading. 

One, I love when the news gets personal and speaks to something I'm focused on at the time, or relates to me.  Like this article, or one I read earlier in the week about the late Cardinal Bevilacqua's complicity with the recent Catholic cover-up trial in Philadelphia.  I kept picturing a photo I have at home of me with Bevilacqua at my confirmation.  He was a Bishop then, and I was thirteen. Cue creep factor...

Next, there is the likelihood that this  show will create the little uptick in 'cool factor' we teachers sometimes see when the media takes something we've been talking about, repackages it, and sells it.  Like when 'Beowulf' was made into a movie,  or when 'Pride and Prejudice' suddenly got the Kiera Knightly glow. Goodykoontz talked about the possibility of a swell in academic journalism programs due to this show, the CSI effect, but warns it will be hard for young wanna-be journalists to find jobs. Also, Gatsby fans, be warned. There is this:

  

Finally, Brown's quote.  It perfectly echoes a point that was made all week.  Student news, like all news, must strive to strike a balance between informative, important news and what the audience wants.

Bridget Parker
Seton La Salle High School
Pittsburgh, PA