Copyright Goodheart-Willcox Co., Inc. Copyright Goodheart-Willcox Co., Inc. “What you see is news, what you know is background, what you feel is opinion.” – Lester Markel, journalist 34 Journalism: Publishing Across Media Introduction “What do you want to write about?” “I dunno. Interesting stuff never happens around here.” “We’ve got 20 more minutes to fi ll. Anything interesting in the announcements?” Nothing is more important to a broadcast or publication than strong, relevant and interesting stories—stories that inform and engage the audience. The noted sports writer Bill Plaschke said that the most important concepts in journalism are • ideas, • ideas, • ideas, • reporting, and • writing. This is true whether you work for an online publication that streams school games live, a daily paper that reports the results of yesterday’s school funding vote, a news show that is broadcast weekly, or a newsmagazine that comes out once a month. No matter what your media or your timing, strong stories make strong publications. How do you fi nd great story ideas for your broadcast or publication? The seven news values that you will learn about in the following paragraphs will guide you. Later in this chapter you will learn three ways to locate strong story ideas. News Values News Values Whose job is it to come up with the story ideas? While it is possible for the editors to assign all the stories the staff reports, that is rarely the best way to produce a quality publication or broadcast. Seeing What Others Miss An experienced journalist could walk out of your classroom and locate three or four solid story ideas in less time than it takes you to get through the lunch line. Indeed, Bill Plaschke made that claim to a journalism class at the University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication. “They all laughed. Then two days later, I wrote a story about a 5-foot-4 poor, disabled kid from East L.A. who took two buses for two hours every day to come to football practice to carry water for the football team. It turns out, the coaches fed him and the equipment guys clothed him and they all cheered for him, made him their unofficial mascot. I wrote this story about a great team reaching down to help one of society’s weaker members, and the USC writers came up to me later, all mad, and said, ‘Man, we just thought he was some weird kid who kept showing up.’”