Copyright Goodheart-Willcox Co., Inc. Chapter Two News Values and Story Ideas 35 More often, a strong newsroom is a cooperative community, with everyone—from the editor-in-chief to the newest staff reporter—bringing story ideas to staff meetings. At staff meetings, story ideas are developed and then evaluated for their news values and their value to the particular audience. What is it that makes a strong story? Your high school is like no other, so your high school publication or broadcast should be like no other. The news values help you choose from among the almost infi nite number of possible stories you could cover, so that you fi nd the right ones for your audience. Seven News Values What are the news values? Many journalists identify seven values: proximity, timeliness, impact, prominence, oddity, confl ict and human interest. Most strong stories have at least two or three of these values. Not only do these values help you determine whether or not a story is strong, they also infl uence which is the dominant story, or which story should receive the best position on the page, website or broadcast (Figure 2.1). The stronger the story, the more time or space it should receive. The values also infl uence how you start the story, how you tell the story and the tone, or manner of expression, of the story. Proximity How near is the story to your school? An unexpected power outage at noon on your campus is much more newsworthy than one at a nearby school or one in another state, even if the out-of-state outage covers a wider area and lasts longer, or if a transformer fi re starts it. The story on Figure 2.1 The dominant photo catches the reader’s eye first. This front page begins several stories. Is it difficult to tell which is intended to be the most important story? Courtesy of The Evanstonian, Evanston Township High School