Reply #59: Let me give you a quick lesson in journalism

[Oeditpus Rex]

Every day, in newsrooms throughout the U.S., editors draw up a news budget, noting who's working on what story and, with newspapers, what page it will go on and often how much space will be allowed for it — as well as the angle it's expected to have. The budget doesn't simply say "Kaputnik — school hug protest," but has some background and detail on who will be interviewed, what questions will be asked, etc.

Reporters turn in the stories they're assigned, unless something big breaks and they're called off them. I don't know what fiction might have promoted the idea of reporters coming to their editors with "Hey, I got a better story!" but it doesn't work that way. They can pitch something else during a story meeting — and it'll be hashed out by the editors and then either approved, turned down or sometimes given to another reporter — but the story you're assigned is the one you turn in.

I grant you, though, that there apparently aren't enough reporters whose antennae go up when they hear key words that should lead them to think, "There's another story here." I've worked with too many who missed something that jumped out at me when all I did was edit the story they turned in. A "nose for news" can't be taught; it's got to be in the blood.

As for teaching, my sister has taught elementary school for 31 years, while my experience is limited to guest-teaching journalism to eighth-graders once a week for six weeks. There's no way in hell I could do it professionally (unless I were teaching journalism at a high school whose administration didn't believe in censorship), and I have a great regard for those who can.