A nearby storm to hit journalism education

A nearby storm to strike journalism education

Education in journalism will get the same turmoil as the media have been through for the last 20 years. It begins now in big scale.

Storified by Nils Mulvad · Tue, Sep 11 2012 21:40:30

Amazonaws
According to Howard Finberg, director of Partnerships and Alliances at Poynter Institute, the changes will split journalism education from journalism degrees, traditional classes aren’t as effective as e-learning, training will be mastered by the students themselves, they will tend to get it from the best places in the world, teachers have no chance to follow the rapid changes, and we will need to innovate inside the classroom.

He presented his ideas at European Journalism Centre’s 20th anniversary celebration the 4th of June 2012 in Maastricht, Netherland. On Poynters website there 11 days later was presented a summary of his speech:

Journalism education cannot teach its way to the future | Poynter.As we think about the changes whipping through the media industry, there is a nearby storm about to strike journalism education. The futu…
Here you can see the full text of the speech from Howard Finberg:
The Future of Journalism Education. A Personal Perspective | Poynter’s News UniversityToday (June 4, 2012) I gave the keynote speech at the European Journalism Centre’s 20th anniversary celebration in Maastricht, The Nether…
Just after the speech a Storify of some of the reactions was put together by Howard Finberg:
The Future of Journalism Education: Keynote to European Journalism Centre ConferenceHoward Finberg gave the keynote address at the 20th Anniversary Conference in Maastricht, NI on June 4, 2012. The topic was the future of…
After publishing the summary on the Poynter website, comments on twitter keep coming in:
Interesting Howard Finberg speech on the future of journalism/journalism degrees. Don’t agree w all but worth read: http://www.newsu.org/future-journalism-educationTony J. Lee
Howard Finberg: Journalism education is at its own inflection point http://bit.ly/MQtDdRSteffen Konrath
According to Howard Finberg, "there is a nearby storm about to strike journalism education." http://bit.ly/Mfar8jKevin Sablan
“the world is changing faster than the people who are supposed to teach students can learn themselves.” -howard finberg http://www.poynter.org/how-tos/journalism-education/177219/journalism-education-cannot-teach-its-way-to-the-future/Steve Mays
I think the input is really important. But I need to think and discuss more to find my opinion on this.

At this time, I’m rather convinced on the need for getting training from the best sources, not vasting the time for the students on old systems and knowledge. As a teacher you need to find a way to innovate while you go.
My co-teacher Kristian Strøbech at The Danish School of Media and Journalism and I try to do it by integrating new methods in the training in digital journalism without knowing them beforehand, and develop the use together with the students. Especially on covering events using social and mobile media and integrating it with traditional coverage.
You also need to move more and more of the traditionel training out of the classroom, learning the students methods to solve the different tasks and innovate themselves.
There’s another interesting blogpost of the change in the journalism education, written by Paul Bradshaw:
The 3 forces changing journalism education part 2: the education business | Online Journalism BlogYesterday, in the first part of this series, I talked about how changes in the news industry were reflected in changing journalism educat…
Media crisis

The discussion on the specific need for change in the journalism training now, comes after some heavy input on the situation in the medias. A very interesting presentation of the situation for the media was done by Stijn Debrouwer:
FungibleWe don’t realize how much news media has changed in the past fifteen years. We really don’t. I’m not talking about digital first or about…
Burt Herman from Storify made a collection of the reaction to this blog:
Is journalism being replaced?A look at a week’s worth of reaction and conversation around a provocative blog post discussing the ways that journalism is being replace…
Here Mathew Ingram have done another rather hard and precise description of the situation for the media:
The hard truth: Newspaper monopolies are gone foreverNewspapers haven’t really had a monopoly on the news or the advertising market for some time, but they continue to behave as though they …
More important input – collected in august 2012:

This is a good recap of the discussion from Mary McGuire, from The Canadian Journalism Project:
J-schools at a turning point | J-source.caThe future of journalism education is as uncertain as the future of journalism. Journalism educators everywhere are struggling to adapt t…
A report from august 2012 shows a rather rapid change in the need for journalism training – expressed by the journalist themselves – most from US and Latin America.
Knight report on training shows journalists want technology, multimedia, data skills | Poynter.A new study by the Knight Foundation released today summarizes the state of journalism training. Some findings from "Digital Training Com…
Here’s a very concrete suggestion for a future training:
How far should journalism education reform go?A new proposed degree structure for journalism education This week, journalism educators meet in Chicago. I hope they think about how far…
Guardian has asked for the best tips for journalistic skills of tomorrow – and present these nine:
9 top tips for the journalists of tomorrowHannah Waldram, community coordinator, news, the Guardian Drop the hangups around engaging with readers in comments: We don’t need to con…
This is a very important description of what foundations will support – and not support – in the future education of journalists. They will not support old traditions of educations and skills. They demand fast change and point out some of the paths. They can set the standards – also outside US.
An Open Letter to America’s University PresidentsWe represent foundations making grants in journalism education and innovation. In this new digital age, we believe the "teaching hospital…
Here is a recap of the discussion after the open letter from the 6 foundation:
6 foundations tell journalism schools to change faster or risk future funding | Poynter.As thousands of educators head off to Chicago for the 100th anniversary convention of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mas…
A story in Financial Times focus on e-learning as the main thing to change in training.
Ivory towers will be toppled by an online ‘tsunami’ – FT.comThe internet is about to bring to university professors what it has brought to secretaries, journalists and music executives: unemploymen…
Good input on why people take online training – and especially that they will turn to the best places to get it.
RT @TLBissette: 3 Reasons Why People Take Massively Open Online Learning Courses http://ow.ly/1m3I27Nils Mulvad
A personal update on the discussion – including the society in general as our focus – not only students and media industry:
RT @kstrobech: Rebooting journalism schools – great post summing up this sommer’s hot debate: http://www.ojr.org/ojr/people/Geneva/201208/2084 #journalismNils Mulvad
Howard Finberg comments on the update:
RT @Hif: Rebooting journalism education means constant state of change. @hif writes about @genevaoh post on @poynter http://poy.nu/NcSLlhNils Mulvad
Ajourføring med nogle flere input 2012/09/12
RT @smfrogers: Learn basic #datajournalism with me at @frontlineclub on Friday – last-minute places available http://ow.ly/dCBT6 #ddjNils Mulvad
RT @EricNewton1: Academic research in journalism and communication education: Some of it is so unhelpful no one cites it. http://t.co/OA …Nils Mulvad
RT @knightfdn: How to better protect #students doing #journalism in the “teaching hospital” model http://kng.ht/Tsiki4 v @amberralertt …Nils Mulvad
Conclusions:E-learning: This will be delivered by the best institutions round the world and things will change fast. No reason for not point to the best places. Your own e-learning shall not master everything. Be careful not to build a copy of the traditionel training.
Degrees: Check and work with these new ideas. Make it easy to implement.
Innovate in the classroom:  It’s impossible to master everything. The students must be part of the innovation – take responsibility of it. Focus on the students. Every semester every single teacher must do some innovation and experimentation with focus on new methods and adaption of journalism to the future. We have responsibility to try to find new paths. Innovation will not come from the top – it can only provide the frames for it.
Digital media: No longer possible to take final degree in print, tv and radio – everything must be web, mobile and social media – or at least integrated with it.
Digital journalism: We need a new curriculum to attract good it-people to journalism – to combine the best from two worlds. 
Accept you’re not the master: Development is going faster and faster – and especially it is not possible to be ahead. Things changes faster than our ability to learn. Accept not to be in control.

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