MassLive Photo Submission

For this assignment, I posted a photo to the Mass Live's album of the October snow storm.

Often when I am on campus, I find myself wanting to take pictures of trees. There are such a variety of trees on campus,  and when I see a really good one, I'll often take a picture of it with my phone.

After the snow storm in October, so many trees were destroyed around campus. I saw one tree on campus that had completely split down the middle, and I took my phone out right away to capture it.

After searching Mass Live for content that I could contribute to, I realized that I could add my picture to the October snow storm album. The album was interesting because it showed a progression from people enjoying the snow to some of the devastating effects of the storm. It definitely was a whirlwind of a weekend, and this progression of good and bad is represented well in the album.

I was hoping that people would comment on my photo, but there was not much user activity, likely because the snowstorm is slightly old news. I expect that this timing has a lot to do with the lack of comments. On the other hand, it was neat to be able to view the album after it was for the most part complete. Since I already know the entire result of the storm, it may have been a different experience than if I were to upload my picture as it was still happening. I am glad that I was able to see the whole album as an entire story.

Highs and Lows

I definitely feel like this was one of my better classes so far at UMASS.  I have taken a lot out of this class, and I feel like I have had the opportunity to explore so many new platforms of journalism, written and online.

My favorite part about this class was that we had the opportunity to be involved in various assignments and projects that all served unique purposes.  I can’t believe how many new processes and websites I have become familiar with, especially considering we only met once a week for one semester.  At the beginning of the semester, I wrote that I was looking forward to having assignments that would force me to get out of my comfort zone.  I definitely feel like I have been able to do this, as I have participated in several journalistic endeavors I would not have normally, such as writing a letter to the editor, or calling a radio station.  I had never even kept a blog before this semester, and now I feel very comfortable blogging.

This was my first semester taking any journalism classes, so I went into the class trying to determine whether I would still want to pursue the field.  Various aspects of this class have definitely made me excited about pursuing journalism further.  I really like the idea of blogging, and I could definitely see myself keeping a personal blog, especially since I am studying abroad next semester.  I also became a lot more aquainted with Twitter this semester, and I can now understand the journalistic value of this type of communication tool.  I really enjoyed learning about Twitter, and how it has enabled democracy throughout the world.  I did not really recognize the functional potential of social networking sites, and I feel like it is an invaluable skill to know how to fully utilize technological tools and networks, especially as a journalist.

I think my favorite assignment this semester was writing a letter to the editor.  As I mentioned before, this is not something I would normally do.  This in itself made the project exciting because I feel like I can get the most out of experiences that force me to do something new and different. I really enjoyed the assignment because I found an issue in my hometown that I actually knew a lot about.  I didn’t know that I would be so personally invested in the assignment until I submitted my letter.  I was surprised by the excitement and anxiety that overtook me after I sent off my e-mail.  I kept reciting the parts of my letter that I remembered over and over in my head, trying to determine whether I should have written anything differently.  As I also mentioned in a previous blog post, I found out that my letter was published from one of my high school teachers.  Finding out in this way definitely made it really rewarding, and it made the whole thing an even more exciting experience.  Beyond my own personal experience writing letters to the editor, it was really interesting to learn about the overall significance of letters to the editor in our society and our democracy.  I used to skip over the letters to the editor in magazines and newspapers, thinking that it was merely readers complaining for no good reason.  Even if that may sometimes be the case, I now understand the value of a two-way conversation with all outlets of writing and media.  I liked learning about letters to the editor because I feel like they epitomize this conversation in the most basic and traditional sense.

The thing that I struggled most with in this class was trying to join the conversation with talk radio.  It was in ways a discouraging process because it made me feel like there is so much I do not know, rather than making me feel empowered and unstoppable like some of the other assignments did.  That is obviously good, however, because there is a TON I don’t know, and recognizing where you need to improve is definitely the best way to learn.  Although I could not become fully knowledgable about all of the topics being discussed on talk radio shows, I did become a lot more literate about the whole talk radio process as well as some of the issues they were talking about.

Overall, I feel like this class has made me a lot more aware of the news going on around me, as well as my role as a reader and a potential journalist.  I am starting to be more alert to things around me, recognizing things that I may have once overlooked as potential stories.  I know I have so much more to learn about journalism, but this class has been a great starting point, and I am very excited for what lays ahead.