Spring Semester Classes

Last semester saw me specialising in journalism, but now I’ve taken a change of pace and gone for more variety in my classes, crossing over into the paths of creative writing and women’s gender studies. I’m hoping that this semester will be more enjoyable while still expanding my experiences and building on my professional portfolio.

ENG 205: Creative Writing Fiction

Working outside the journalism writing style and delving into fiction, this class develops elements of fiction writing including: character sketch, plot development, description and dialogue. Taking a workshop format we will be developing short stories and giving class feedback, working towards a portfolio of manuscripts at the end of the semester.

WGSS 216: Hollywood and Beyond

This class explores the ideologies of gender, race and sexuality in the movies. During this module we will be looking at contemporary Hollywood films from a feminist perspective. This is something that has always held an interest for me through studying media, and I’m looking forward to taking a more specialised approach.

JOUR 305: Media Design

I’m hoping that this class will help to develop my very basic knowledge of InDesign, which is a valuable skill in the print journalism industry. This class gives us the opportunity to design newspapers, PR materials, photo spreads and reinvent logos.

JOUR 480: Magazine Production

Gaining hands on experience of magazine writing and production techniques by producing content for the monthly campus publication DIG magazine, and content and design for an issue of Beach Byline magazine. Hopefully the added experience of different publications will prove a valuable asset to my journalism portfolio!

Week 1: Classes

Study Abroad isn't all about trips to the beach and getting the best tan, we are actually here to study.  This year I am taking a major in Journalism, as this can only be taken as a minor as part of my Mass Communication degree at home. I’m hoping that this will give me an opportunity to have a more in-depth study of journalism, and to gain valuable experience that will help to further my career.

J310: Writing for the Daily 49er

This module encourages students to get involved with the media on campus, by writing a minimum of 15 articles a semester for the student run Daily 49er newspaper. To me, it seems incredible to be getting class credit for things that I would usually do in my own time. I think this is a great program to encourage student involvement, a must for any future journalist.

J374: Written Communication for Public Relations

After having some hands-on PR experience in a summer placement I thought it would be interesting to take a module in PR during my study abroad year, as this is something that isn’t available at home. I feel like I’ve been thrown in at the deep end, as my past experience is mostly based around journalism. This seems to be an intense class providing an opportunity to create PR material for a local non-profit organisation.

J316: Feature Writing

To balance out the heavy news focus of the Daily 49er module I decided to take a features class, as this is a style that I find interesting and enjoyable to write. So far it seems to be a fairly basic class, considering it is a third year module. Aspects of what makes a feature are repetitive and mostly common sense. However, the assignments offer a sense of freedom in feature writing so there will hopefully be something to show at the end of the semester.

J320: Advanced Reporting

There seems to be a lot of cross-over between each of my modules, especially in this class which combines aspects of both news and feature writing. There is a change to develop a more investigative style which is something new to me, but otherwise this class is currently falling short.

www.daily49er.com

Overall, my first impression is to wonder what the Long Beach students have been studying for the last two years. The repetition of content that has been drilled into me since day one at UH is very mundane, and the cross-over between modules suggests a lack of specialism in the different areas. Basic concepts are drawn out, with an array of unnecessary reading and homework assignments. I feel like I’m back in high school! On the plus side, the variety of written assignments in each module will hopefully be filling up my portfolio by the end of the semester!