being honest about journalism school

In the article “Let’s be honest about J-school”, Patrick Thornton is quite straight forward in saying why one should or should not attend a journalism school and the reality of what J-school represents. He even goes as far by stating that not attend the journalism school if you are not ready to or not willing to work on the web (whether it be with codes, blogging etc.),or to do more with your hands then he frankly says that journalism isn’t for you.

The top ranked J-schools he mentions is the Columbia University, many of the great journalists came from the programme at this university. This university was sited to have the top programme in journalism, but this was true a decade or two ago. He says that it is not that he is criticizing this university but many of these graduates’ curriculums are outdated. He suggests the project-based studio 20 at New York University; here the students work on different projects with different skills each term. He also suggests the CUNY’s entrepreneurial program over Columbia’s outdated structure. Therefore, when attending a graduate journalism programme you would want to walk out the program fully equipped in that this program taught you how to start your own projects and to be entrepreneurial.

Patrick mentions the professors’ matter, which means that they the professors should be equipped in understanding the intersections of modern technology and journalism. The professors think ahead are not stagnated through globalisation therefore, NYU and CUNY are better off that Columbia.

A distinction between undergraduate and graduate school is made, this difference entails that at undergraduate journalism degree teaches you the minimum skills that teaches you how to write do research and report. The graduate degree on the other hand states that you already have a degree (not the undergraduate journalism degree) what this degree allows you to do is that if you still want to pursue your dream in journalism.

Lastly, he says that attending J-school makes no sense for connection and improving your writing skills. What he is saying is that you do not need J-school for connections because getting connections online is not really such a hard task. He says that writing skills is overrated reason being that in journalism reporting is the heart of journalism, not writing. His thought on returning to journalism school rather go back to improve and broaden your reporting skills because good journalism is about serving the audience in the way you speak (reporting).