Copyright Goodheart-Willcox Co., Inc. Chapter Two News Values and Story Ideas 39 shorten the school year, or requirements for work permits may be changed. How would these events affect your campus? How does college tuition going up (it almost never goes down), affect recent alumni and seniors (Figure 2.4)? If immunization requirements are changed for the fall, how does the requirement to have the whooping cough vaccine affect your audience? School board meetings may not seem as exciting as football games, but if the school board changes graduation requirements or considers a change in the district’s cellphone policy, your publication or broadcast needs to tell your audience about it. Prominence If the people involved in the story are prominent (well-known), then the story is more newsworthy. Prominence is the quality of standing out, being conspicuous or being widely known. If the starting defensive lineman for the varsity football team is taking a course in American Sign Language at a community college, the story is more newsworthy than if a less well-known student is doing the same thing. An article on the childhood of a local physician may not have great news value, unless he happens to be the son of author Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., whose “Cat’s Cradle” is read by sophomores at your school and whose “Slaughterhouse-Five” is read by the seniors. Dr. Vonnegut’s prominence makes a story about a local physician newsworthy (Figure 2.5). If a popular student who graduated last year wins the Young Entrepreneur of the Year award for your city, his prominence probably makes for a good story. If, however, the award is won by a less well-known student who graduated four years ago, he probably does not have enough prominence to make the story worthwhile. If a high school senior runs for a seat on your school board, his prominence on your campus makes the story newsworthy, even though you may not choose to regularly comment on school board candidates (Figure 2.6 on the next page). Figure 2.4 A distant story becomes a strong local one when you understand its impact on your audience and include the news value of prominence. The G-W G-W Gazette Falcons protest UC tuition increase by Ima Journalist Published 11/24/2014 5:50 PST Tweet Three recent Ocean Vista alumni joined walkouts at University of California campuses Monday protesting proposed tuition hikes while seniors express worry. Suzanne Jacobian helped occupy UC Berkeley’s Wheeler Hall, while Sunny Huynh and Charlie Washington demonstrated at UC Riverside and UC Santa Barbara. All three students graduated in 2014. The UC Board of Regents voted Wednesday to raise tuition by 5 percent each year for the next five years. Students who applied this fall expecting to pay $12,192 a year in tuition would pay $15,564 by 2019 under the plan. Jacobean, 2013–14 ASB president, tweeted, “Tuition hike is insane. We’re taken hostage by the Regents.” Huynh, who entered UC Riverside as a sophomore because of AP credits, posted Instagram photos of herself among other students flashing the three-finger Hunger Games salute, while Washington, last June’s Ocean Vista co-valedictorian, reports chalking protest messages and art on the UCSB sidewalk. OV seniors also reacted negatively to the Regent’s decisions. Ana Sanchez-Morales and her twin brother Hugo both applied to UC schools. “My parents are teachers. How could they afford $31,000 in tuition for us, plus books, fees and living expenses? “The UC’s were supposed to provied a world class education for students who prepared themselves. We kept our part of the bargain. We want the UC system to do the same.” LATEST Study abroad open house at 4 p.m. on Dec. 18 in the small gym Figure 2.5 A story becomes more prominent if a well- known individual is involved. Courtesy of The Villager, Westport High School