"Officials quiz regents on budget" Raises Questions, Confusion

A front-page story that ran Thursday, Feb.5, titled, “Officials quiz regents on budget”, summarized a meeting held by an education appropriations subcommittee held the day before.

The subcommittee is questioning whether or not to approve a $$ million state funding increase for the University of Iowa, Iowa State University and the University of Northern Iowa.  The story goes back and forth, sharing the opinions of those in favor and opposed to the increase.

Printed just below the flag and teasers on the front page, the story serves as one of the dominant news topics for the day.  While the story is short, around 500 words, it provides insight from two of the three university presidents, as well as members of the Board of Regents and House representatives.

A key problem throughout the story, however, is its confusion.  The reporter fails to mention who attended the meeting, further confusing readers by quoting its sources without any context of where the information was attained.  Additionally, the story doesn’t say when the decision will be made or whom it is ultimately up to.  If readers are unaware of the funding process, they are also left questioning what happens next.

As an editor, I would have asked the reporter to do some more digging and explain the process of budgeting for public universities.  Furthermore, since it is a front-page story, I would have assigned the reporter to conduct more background research on past budget increases so as to help readers understand why this story is important in the first place.

Layout wise, there wasn’t much the editor could have done visually.  A small mugshot of Sally Mason was sufficient, as she is the only source within the story that readers can recognize and relate to.  

What's Next for Student Debt

On Monday, April 16, The Des Moines Register ran a front-page story (below the fold), titled “Rise in defaults renews ‘student debt bomb’ warnings”.  The story ran at the very bottom of the front page, just above the weather and price, receiving about four inches of vertical space that ran the total width of the page.  When redirected to page 8A, the “Register Special Report” consumes more than 75 percent of the page, with the main story and three accompanying stories dominating with a text-heavy layout.

The story covers issues of student debt nationally and locally, with the lede stating that Iowa has the fourth-largest default rate on student loans.  The highest percentage of delinquent buyers are individuals in their 30s, but the story emphasizes that people of all ages are defaulting on student loans, including senior citizens that owe more than $36 billion in loans, 5 percent of which is past due.  The main issue woven throughout the facts is that debt defaults are nearly doubling each year, and knowing that interest rates will increase this summer, economists are worried that it will negatively affect the financial market.

The three accompanying stories profile three individuals who have been negatively affected in different ways by having to pay back student loans. 

While the content is well written and timely, the way in which the news editor decided to present this story is a bit confusing.  The largest story run that day dealt with the past weekend’s tornado destruction, with “BATTERED” running across the page and a very large picture of the destruction right underneath the headline.  I will agree that readers are likely more interested in the storms’ damage to towns surrounding the area, but the space the student debt story received is not advertised in a way that attracts readers to the story or its accompanying stories on page 8A.

When the reader opens to 8A, the eye has no place to go.  The subheadline is small, the only visuals are tiny mugshots of the profiled individuals, and the layout is awkward and text heavy. 

For such a large story, I could only find one questionable sentence that both a copyeditor and page editor should have considered revising.  The sentence, “Many factors increase the likelihood of default, including working full time while enrolled, taking classes part-time and not graduating, Iowa College Aid said,” would benefit from the use of an oxford comma to prevent confusion over whether the reporter meant part-time students don’t graduate, or both part-time students and those working full time while enrolled don’t graduate.  

Overall, the coverage of the story was well done.  The reporter spoke to a number of professional sources and went as far as profiling individuals directly affected by the topic.  With some design improvements, however, the story could have attracted readers who found the large amount of text daunting. 

Adults Attempting to get Four-Year Degrees

On Monday, April 16, 2012, The New York Times published an article in the National section of their paper, titled, “Opening Up  a Path To Four-Year degrees.”

The article provides a lot of anecdotes, making it interesting, but it fails to present any statistics about adults (years out of high school) entering into community colleges, then renowned Ivy League universities.

Additionally, although most of the story is objective, the reporter, Michael Winerip, uses his own son’s story about attending a community college before New York University.  It not only uses “I”, but adds little to the story, since his son is fresh out of high school.

Overall, the story lacks any sort of significance to be a front-page story on the New York Times.  If the anecdotes were supported with facts quoted by professional sources and statistics from reputable studies, it might have been a stronger story.  Therefore, if I had been the editor, I would have allowed the reporter more time to gather more information before printing the story. 

As far as the layout is concerned, the front page appropriately includes a picture of the person whose anecdote is mentioned first.  In the redirected page, page A10, a large photograph with each of the other students mentioned is front and center, drawing the eye into the story and establishing the story’s dominance over the other articles on the page.

Iowa Seeks No Child Left Behind Waiver

When President George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 into law, teachers around the country immediately began to feel the pressure.

The act requires a number of things, one of them ensuring that teachers be “highly qualified”.  To be “highly qualified” a teacher must “hold full licensure and have any requirements waited on an emergency or provisional basis”, have at least a bachelor’s degree, and be competent in the subject matter being taught (either holding a degree in the subject taught or passing a state exam).

While this is a decent attempt to improve student competency, it is unrealistic after analyzing data that shows student enrollment is increasing while classroom size is decreasing, because this increases the demand for teachers, making it harder to fulfill these requirements.

Additionally, the way in which the government documents student progress is through standardized testing, and public schools receive federal funding only if meeting the minimum scores.  The goal was to bring each public school to proficiency within five years, but this is not happening because it is not an attainable goal.

However, in an effort to meet proficiency, teachers are putting aside valuable learning time to help them memorize information they know will be on these national tests.  This is not only cheating the system, but it’s preventing students from learning in a stress-free environment, not to mention causing them to miss out on learning anything that’s not within the government’s requirements (and there’s a lot, but that’s an entirely different blog post).

So, Iowa is formally seeking a NCLB waiver, citing the act as “too rigid and relying too heavily on standardized test scores to rate schools”.  If granted, Title 1 schools will be no longer, and teachers will be free to teach in ways they feel best for their students while still abiding by national and state educational standards. 

President Obama has already granted 11 states waivers, so let’s hope Iowa is number 12.

As an editor, I question the methods in which the first 11 states achieved the waiver, as it was only mentioned, not detailed, in the story.  Additionally, who is seeking the waiver?  What potential changes may this have on what Governor Branstad wants to do about holding non-reading third graders back?  These are all questions that can be researched and reported on, further strengthening the story and answering questions that parents of students may have.  

Virtual Schools in Iowa -- Good or Bad?

Two Iowa school districts are urging legislators to allow the implementation of an Internet-based curriculum, ridding of the traditional classroom and face-to-face interactions.

CAM Community School District, serving the southwestern towns of Cumberland, Anita and Messina, and Clayton Ridge Community School District, including Garnavillo and Guttenberg in the northeast, plan to begin a curriculum in which students are taught primarily online starting this fall.

CAM and Clayton Ridge districts will team with Iowa Virtual Academy, an online education company owned and operated by K12 Inc., to develop a program that caters to individual students’ needs while still meeting state and national education standards.  Because K12 Inc., is a publicly owned company traded in the New York Stock Exchange, however, questions of legality have started to arise.

Some Iowans fear their tax dollars will go directly into K12 Inc.’s pockets rather than online programs.  A prospective bill on education reform, however, is working its way through the Senate and House in an effort to put limitations on Iowa Virtual Academy functions.

The Senate Education Committee passed an education reform bill package on Wednesday, which would allow Iowa to offer Internet-based schools, yet place restrictions on the cost per student and verification of student learning.  A House version of the education reform bill passed Tuesday night.  Both the Senate and House will debate the contents of the bill in coming weeks.

While virtual classrooms may seem like a good idea to some, all Iowans, legislators and parents especially, should understand the potential disadvantages of allowing such “classrooms” to be created.

K12 Inc. and Iowa Virtual Academy keep highlighting the idea of individualized instruction in a virtual classroom.  An Internet-based class would permit students to work at their own pace, but the online teachers would be unfamiliar with the way a student learns best, thus hindering their ability to understand content effectively and efficiently.

For instance, a teacher in a traditional classroom setting can physically work with a student and grow to understand if he or she learns best one-on-one, in a group, with technology, with visuals, simply reading the information or with supplemental videos or experiments.  An online teacher only knows whether the student answered the question correctly or not, and without explanation, has no idea how the student arrived at the correct answer.

Additionally, a traditional classroom provides students with a chance to interact with one another and build social skills.  A virtual classroom would allow interaction with other students, but with no context and no physical contact.

And what about recess?  Physical education?  Music and art class?  Students in a virtual classroom will surely be technologically savvy, but it is unclear whether students will have a well-rounded, culturally rich education.

The pros and cons of a traditional classroom versus an online classroom can be infinitely debated, but it will ultimately come down to the best option for the student.  However, as a future teacher in a traditional setting, I question success a student can have in a limiting, online classroom.  A traditional classroom with a physically present teacher can challenge students to reach academic achievements in an individually catered manner, a manner in which it will be extremely difficult for an online teacher to do if he or she has never met the student.

Some answers to this story were left unquestioned by the reporter.  One, the reader is left questioning whether students from all over the state of Iowa are eligible to sign up for this virtual schooling.  Second, it doesn't answer whether tax payer money is going to come into play, especially since the program is a for-profit one.  Finally, parents both for and against this type of schooling were not interviewed, which doesn't have a huge effect on the story, but could sway readers one way or another as to whether they believe in such schooling for their children.  If I had been the editor, I would have prompted the reporter to do a little more digging on the success of virtual classrooms in other states, and interviewed those parents and parents from Iowa.  It would have made for a better story package that could have been a dominant story on the front page.