Journalism, Minor

In addition to University Requirements:

• Complete individual plan requirements.

Students may be able to use some courses to meet more than one requirement. Contact your advisor for details.

No more than fifty percent of the units used to satisfy minor requirements may be used to satisfy major requirements.

Minimum Units for Completion	19

Student Learning Outcomes

Students will develop a strong foundation in the history, philosophy, laws, and ethics of journalism, and will incorporate this knowledge into their practice of journalism. Students will:

• Understand the laws governing news communication and American traditions of press freedom, particularly the democratic value and responsibility of circulating information in a free society
• Balance these freedoms and responsibilities within the constraints of laws and ethical codes in journalism, and apply this knowledge to differing codes of conduct, freedoms, and constraints that exist in other countries.
• Critically examine and ethically adapt codes of conduct in journalism to current and emerging media technologies, with the goal of identifying how and where global populations consume and produce journalism, and how this experience of journalism affects codes of conduct and freedoms or constraints existing in other countries.
• Identify story ideas through observing their surroundings, connecting to communities, and understanding narrative structures; including applying such elements as timeliness, proximity, impact, and other news and storytelling criteria, to know when and how to dig deeper for stories that go beyond superficial topics and engage their audience in thinking differently about everyday events.
• Engage in the process of research, relationship building, and investigative skill development, such as, interviewing techniques and other information gathering processes, to write and publish stories, from breaking news, features, and deeper, under-reported stories (and everything in between) occurring locally and globally.
• Learn how to research, and write about city and county governments, police, courts, schools, and other public or citizen entities using the Freedom of Information Act and other tools.
• Show attention to accommodating diversity in their news stories through identifying cultural differences in storytelling and the effects of cultural, political, historical, religious, ideological, and economic forces on the dissemination of information, and identifying how U.S. ethnic and global cultural diversity shape content and audience experiences of content.
• Develop self-directed projects that synthesize foundational theories and journalism ethics incorporating creative and technical approaches to journalism across a variety of media.
• Consistently and continually develop their craft of writing through analysis and critique of their use of style, narrative technique, point of view, tone, etc. to compose compelling non-fiction narratives and accurately incorporate information obtained from multiple sources.
• Understand the responsibilities of editors and how editors work with other media professionals.
• Practice the application of ethical considerations to editing and to planning how journalists cover stories.
• Engage in intensive writing and rewriting of lengthy, detailed feature stories.

Minor Requirements

• Take the following 19 units: 

  • JLS 105, JLS 131, JLS 205, JLS 231, JLS 232 (13 units)
  • COM 131 (3 units)
  • Select one course from: JLS 328W, JLS 335W (3 units)

• Be aware that some courses may have prerequisites that you must also successfully complete. For prerequisite information, click on the course or see your advisor.

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