2020 - Summer

The Virtual Newsroom: Covering the COVID-19 Pandemic in Real-Time (Session 1)

Course Number: SS1: JOUR-UA 302.002

Day & Time: Mon/Thu, 1:00-4:00pm Eastern Time

Location: Online

Instructor: Liza Hogan

Albert Class Number: 6197

Working with a team of student journalists in a virtual, daily newsroom you will cover perhaps the most important story of our time: the coronavirus pandemic. You will learn by doing, employing the latest digital tools and reporting techniques to report on the crisis in your community, telling the stories of the people around you, and documenting the ways their lives have been upended.

Your stories and others will be published on a COVID-focused news website to be launched for this class. From the social-distanced safety of your home, you will report, write, and edit multiple stories over the six-week course including an enterprise story examining one of your subjects in depth. You will produce graphics, photos, and video for your articles, learning the skills of a digital reporter, editor, and producer along the way.

As part of the news team, you will name and manage the website, track traffic, analyze site metrics, and share your work on social media. By the end of the course, you’ll have a set of professionally edited, bylined clips and a shared website demonstrating your ability to cover a massive health and economic crisis in real-time.

Don’t be just a passive witness to the pandemic; join us in documenting history.

Note: Counts as an elective for the journalism major and both journalism minors.