Nothing to write about, you say?

As an editor for the Campus News section in the CHIMES, I have often dealt with the, “There is nothing to write about!”  and the “Can you give me ideas pleeeeease?”  So when I walked into the “Finding Features on the Two-Year Campus” seminar at the Journalism Conference in Chicago it was nice to know that I wasn’t the only one facing this problem. Tom Pierce, the speaker, gave us a whole list of ideas that staffers can use just by asking faculty and other staff on our campus them. It could be a story on who on campus is hiding a litter of kittens in their closet. Or, who gives you a refund when the vending machine on campus steals your money? Pierce explained that you can talk to students, alumni, staff, and faculty about their lives or interesting hobbies they may enjoy. For instance, you could interview someone who is a veteran and find out more about their lives. Or maybe, you have a faculty member who likes to wrestle alligators in their spare time.  Pierce also explained you have to decide whether a story follows news values, (impact, timeliness, proximity, prominence, etc.) or it follows reader values, (sex, scandals, humor, celebrities, etc.). Some of these stories are interesting, some are important, some are both, and some are neither. What an editor has to do is make sure the staffers are out there looking for stories so they don’t have to hear, “Nothing ever happens on this campus,” at every meeting.

Mollie Carter, '14 | Online/Campus Co-Editor