Time flies

It's hard to believe, but I'm already done teaching my five-week Introduction to Journalism class, or at least I will be done tomorrow after the final exam. A month ago, I had only just begun. That's the beauty of summer classes -- they're intense while they last, but they are over before you know it.

It's been a good class. My summer students are usually my best ones. This class was no exception. They kept me on my toes with good questions and a desire to learn.

I have two weeks now before the fall semester begins. I'll be teaching another five-week class -- the Metro State journalism department offers three of its core courses in five-week increments each semester -- and this one is even more intense. It's Beginning Reporting, a class where students do an assignment a day. Practice, practice, practice -- it's the only way to really learn how to report and write like my students' future jobs will require. But that daily practice means I'll have 15 assignments a day to grade. Ugh. Grading is the part of teaching I dislike the most. (And I don't have teaching assistants to do my grading for me . . . I wish I did.)

Meanwhile, I have a few reporting assignments of my own to juggle as I prepare for the fall and finish up the grading from the summer class. Teaching takes up a lot of my time, and between my two jobs (writing and teaching), I talk more about teaching and spend more time thinking about it than writing. (The teaching is still somewhat new, whereas the writing is like second nature, I guess.) Sometimes it's hard to switch my focus and remember I'm still a journalist, too, not only a journalism teacher.

Living by the heart, not a code

In class this week I've been giving my students a crash course in journalism ethics. It's a crash course because it's an inexhaustible topic . . . one that continually challenges my journalistic ideals and keeps me wondering how such polar opposites can exist in journalism . . . the likes of Woodward and Bernstein, who never set out to become famous but became so through their dogged reporting on the Watergate scandal . . . and the likes of people like Jayson Blair, who fabricated and plagiarized story after story in the New York Times, leading to his own firing and the resignation of several editors there.

Today we examined the story of Stephen Glass, a reporter at The New Republic magazine who got caught fabricating 27 of the 41 stories he had written for the magazine over the course of a couple of years. (For more on how Glass got caught, go here.) We watched the 2003 movie about Glass, a made-for-Hollywood film that I'm sure takes some liberties to tell the story, but my, what a story it is. It all boils down to the fact that little by little, Glass inserted lies into his stories, to the point he fabricated entire articles, and didn't get caught for a while. A "60 Minutes" piece that you can also watch on the DVD of the film shows a now supposedly contrite Glass apologizing for his misdeeds. His regret seems insincere. You've got to wonder how a guy gets to the point of making stuff up, passing it off as nonfiction and then lying to his editors about making it up.

Unfortunately, this is the kind of journalism that makes news. Reporters who don't screw up don't become headlines. They just go about their work, all the while the vast majority of the public suspects that somewhere in the average journalist is a liar and a cheat like Stephen Glass.

For their writing assignment due this week, my students have to answer the question, "What makes the difference between an ethical journalist and an unethical one?" Many of them will give me answers like, "An ethical journalist follows the code of ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists, while unethical ones don't." (The SPJ is a trade association whose code of ethics includes seeking the truth and reporting it, minimizing harm to people involved in and affected by stories, acting independently of outside pressures and sources like advertisers and public relations people, and being accountable, i.e. admitting your mistakes when you make them.) That answer is a shallow one -- it doesn't really get to the heart of the issue.

I think what separates an ethical journalist from an unethical one is not a code. It's the heart. Stephen Glass admits that he lied and made up stories for his own glory. He wanted to be liked. He gleaned satisfaction and self-esteem from having the wittiest, most entertaining stories in his magazine. He wanted to be the center of attention. After Jayson Blair got caught making up stories in the New York Times, his editors thought back to some of the stories he covered and thought, "Gee, I wondered how he was able to get the interviews he did and get sources to open up like he did." Blair selfishly played with the newspaper's reputation because it felt good to be the one reporter who got what nobody else seemingly could. That should be a red flag to editors -- but, see, editors have their own vain ambitions as well. They want to be the editors behind the reporters getting the great stories.

On the flip side, we have the example of James Nachtwey, a war photographer featured in the documentary film War Photographer. For more information on him, go here. There's quite a bit of political commentary in the film I don't necessarily subscribe to. (Nachtwey sees himself as protesting war by covering war and hopes his images influence people to stop whatever brawl they're involved in.) But there are ethical lessons to be gleaned from how Nachtwey goes about his work. He's unassuming; he lets people tell their stories and visibly respects those in his photo-stories. He has basically given up any chance for a "regular person's" life to do what he does -- you can't exactly travel the globe covering its conflicts and keep a stable environment with a family at home. Not every journalist can do what Nachtwey does, nor is he the only example of a journalist who tries, at least, to approach his stories and the people in them with respect and dignity. His personality doesn't make him an ethical journalist, but the heart behind his work does.

I wrote in a previous blog that teaching journalism ethics is my least favorite part of teaching this class. It's actually my most favorite as well. The topic fascinates me and confounds me at the same time. It fascinates me because I've tried so hard in my career to treat people right and to cover stories with care. I hate to make mistakes in my work, and I think that reflects my heart to do the job well. Ethics confound me as well because there are examples like Glass and Blair. Their selfishness saddens me because they, not the plenty of ethical journalists out there, are often the face of journalism to the world. Journalists are not like doctors or lawyers. There's no examination to pass before you can call yourself a journalist. There's no license to practice journalism, which makes it vulnerable to be hijacked by impostors.

My students (like a lot of people, I might add) want hard and fast rules to follow. Give them the exact thing you want them to do, and they're happy. It's easy to look at something like the Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics and read it like a list of do's and don'ts. To me, though, it's about the heart. My husband and I talk often about people in our line of work who are motivated by selfish ambition. You can sniff these people out pretty easily because their stories are usually ultimately about them, not the people they're writing about, interviewing, etc. (You can see this on TV talk shows when the host has to pontificate about how much he or she knows about the topic, all the while never really asking the interviewee a question.)

Ego is a tricky thing. It plays such a huge role in journalism. Young journalists are taught to be competitive, hungry to get the hot story. They're told to become self-promoters eager to get the best opportunities. Some would argue that without this kind of attitude, journalists would lie down, let important stories go untold and let their competitors win the race to get the best news first. But this is also what leads to the Stephen Glasses of the world.

I think the James Nachtweys of the world are a dying breed. Yes, they've become well-known for their work, and they've done excellent work at that. But they've managed to do it without seeking the fame and without becoming totally cynical to the world around them. The difference is the heart.

Summer colds

What's the deal with getting a cold in the middle of summer?

I woke up Sunday morning, and my throat was dry and scratchy. I thought it was just a result of sleeping with the fan on for several days in a row. But the scratchiness didn't go away. In fact, it's turned into sniffling, sneezing and that out-of-breath feeling just walking around the house or exerting myself in any simple way-- all symptoms of a cold. I usually get colds in the fall or winter, but I've never had one in the middle of summer. It's 90 degrees outside, and I'm inside sneezing, sniffling and wanting to take a nap.

I saw a blurb on a medical site on the Internet that said summer colds are just a misnomer for hay fever, i.e. allergies. Nope, I don't think these symptoms are just allergies.

I think I may have picked it up from my students, several of whom are also muddling through summer colds. Oh, well. I do feel a little better today, well enough to exercise this morning. I think I may head out into the sunshine this afternoon.

I guess there's a bright side to having a cold in the summertime: At least there's warmth, sunshine and all those fun summer things to do waiting for you outside once you feel better.

New recruits

On Monday I started teaching a five-week version of Introduction to Journalism and Mass Media at Metro State College of Denver. It was a weird week to start teaching a summer class with the Fourth of July falling in the middle of it, but it was good to be back in the classroom again.

I have 15 students -- some of them wanting to go into journalism, others just taking the class as an elective. The five-week summer version of the course is my favorite to teach. The class moves quickly, which keeps both me and the students more interested in the material. (By week 9 or 10 of a regular semester class, it's tempting to just check out and wish the end of the semester would come quickly.) I feel like I get to know the students better as well, since I see them four days a week for two hours a day. Summer students tend to be a bit more motivated as well. I figure if you're going to school over the summer, you either have to or you want to.

I've taught this class so many times, it's hard sometimes for me to see it from a fresh perspective. Those new eyes always seem to come with what we did in class today. I always show the movie "All the President's Men," the story of how two Washington Post reporters broke the Watergate story in 1972, at this point in the course. It serves as a good introduction to the topic of newspapers and their role in American society. The movie, based on the nonfiction book by the same name, also never fails to put a little inspiration back into my journalistic heart as well. The film (made in 1976) stars two very young but now famous actors, Robert Redford as Bob Woodward and Dustin Hoffman as Carl Bernstein. I always manage to get something out of watching these two portray Woodward and Bernstein, America's first real celebrity journalists (although they didn't set out to become celebrities). I've seen the film probably 10 times, but I never get tired of it.

What struck me today was watching Woodward (Redford) insist on having real, definitive facts before he ran with a story, while Bernstein (Hoffman) was more comfortable inferring things, assuming things, filling in the blanks. I tend to be more like Woodward. In my career I've lived through the consequences of making assumptions, even in small things that don't really seem to matter. As a journalist you can't even assume you know how to spell someone's name, no matter how simple it is, like Joe Smith or Jane Johnson. You have to ask questions -- and keep asking them -- even if you think you understand something. I've gotten over the fear of sounding stupid by asking "dumb" questions. I'd rather sound stupid in an interview than look stupid when a story is published and is wrong.

These are the little nuances of being in journalism that are fun to see with new eyes and try to pass on to the "new recruits" in my classes. It's even more fun in the other class I teach, Beginning Reporting (which I won't teach until the fall), where students learn the basics of writing news stories. I know I drive my students crazy, nitpicking on "minor" things like spelling people's names correctly. They get zeros on their assignments for spelling names wrong -- even getting one little letter in a person's name wrong. I tell them that learning to pay attention to details begins now in the classroom, not when they get their first job. They balk when they get their first zero -- and most of my students get at least one zero through the course of a semester -- but they learn quickly to double check and triple check what they're doing. And when the occasional student begs me to give them a break -- after all, they thought they double-checked everything -- I remind them that I'm training them for the real world, where not only editors/producers, but readers/viewers/listeners expect journalists to be professionals. It's serious business, and now is the time to take it seriously.

I also tell them that in a bigger sense, integrity begins with the little things. And how you handle the little things reflects how you'll handle the big things. Some people don't grasp that Woodward and Bernstein didn't have the story of their careers handed to them. Their editor never called them into his office and said, "Hey, guys, write this huge investigative piece on Watergate, will you? We've figured out all the details; we just need some hotshot writers like you to write it for us."

No, they pieced it together little by little, one development at a time. Those developments were uncovered for two years before President Richard Nixon resigned in 1974. And Woodward was there, insisting that the stories be based on facts, not assumptions. Call me an idealist, but that's the kind of journalist I want these "new recruits" to be.

Compassionate leadership

I read this on leadership expert John C. Maxwell's Leadership Wired newsletter (http://www.injoy.com/) and thought I'd share it here. It is challenging and thought-provoking.

COMPASSIONATE LEADERSHIP
Consider these sobering statistics:
• Two of three Americans are overweight.

• One child dies of hunger in the world every four seconds.

To feed a starving child for a year costs roughly $200, about the same amount the average American spends each year on soft drinks. By simply passing up soda, Americans could cut child hunger by 75% worldwide.

Leaders are responsible for leveraging their influence to serve others. When leaders use power for selfish benefit, we commonly refer to their “abuse” of power. Would it be a stretch to claim that Americans abuse their power by guzzling sodas when malnourished children are dying in slums?

Now, it’s impractical to think that Americans would never spend another dollar for Pepsi or Coke, and it’s unreasonable to ask of them. However, when 65% of Americans are overweight, surely some changes can be made to cut consumption in the USA and give generously to those in poverty around the world.

The list of the world’s ailments can be daunting—AIDS, starvation, water shortages, environmental contamination, etc. However, the affluence of Americans may be equal to the task, if only leaders would mobilize the resources within their grasp.

Many are simply too lazy to contribute to social causes, or they refuse to let the world’s problems disrupt their comfort. Still others justify their inaction by citing the “drop in the bucket” mentality. However, with enough drops, a bucket gets full.

Leaders are honor-bound to assist those in need. In the words of U2’s Bono, “In the Global Village, distance no longer decides who is your neighbor, and ‘Love thy neighbor’ is not advice, it’s a command.” In the age of globalization, we buy shoes made in China, shirts from India, oil from the Middle East, and diamonds from Africa. Is it just for children in those regions to suffer and starve while ours eat potato chips and play X-box?

THE CHALLENGE
How are you modeling compassionate leadership?

To what causes are you lending your resources?

How are you inspiring others to give generously to social causes?

Mike and I have had the pleasure of sponsoring two children through two different Christian relief organizations, Compassion International and World Vision. (The photo above is from Compassion's Web site, http://www.compassion.com/. A little girl named Hanna has a tea party outside her home in Guatemala.) Through Compassion, we sponsor a 13-year-old girl named Princy who lives in India, and through World Vision (http://www.worldvision.org/), we sponsor 6-year-old Lawrence who lives in Zimbabwe. Our monthly sponsorships provide Princy and Lawrence with basic needs -- health care, education, school supplies, spiritual teaching and formation, etc.

I started sponsoring Princy in 2001, before Mike met and I got married. I was inspired to start sponsoring her in part because I had just returned from a three-month experience in India, where the contrasts between rich and poor are staggering. The rich live just like most Americans -- nice homes, nice cars, nice clothing, opportunities to get a good education. In the area of India where I was, the poor live interspersed in the neighborhoods of the rich -- mostly in shacks rigged up in alleyways. Children dressed in rags beg on the street corners. Poor men may drive rickshaws or do the laundry of their rich neighbors. Younger women care for their children. Day after day poor older men and women hammer rocks into tiny pieces for construction projects.

I have also seen poverty in other parts of the world -- Vietnam, Mexico, the Dominican Republic. Seeing poverty like that had an impact on me. I have memories of these places -- the sights, sounds, smells, even tastes -- that snap me back into reality when I catch myself thinking that I'm lacking in any material way. It's easy in the United States to think you don't have enough -- after all, there are plenty of people who have more. But how much is enough? And when do we start giving away the excess we have?

Princy and her family live in a fishing village in south India, and it's been a joy to be part of her life for the past six years. We exchange letters a few times a year. A photo of her on my desk prompts me to pray for her and her family. It means a lot to me and Mike to be part of her life -- only one little life among the more than a billion souls in India, but that little life matters.

A few months ago, Mike and I started sponsoring Lawrence, who lives in a community in Zimbabwe severely affected by AIDS. Of the 40 million people worldwide suffering from AIDS, 24 million live in Africa. In Zimbabwe, the life expectancy for women is 34 years; for men, it's 37 years. (This is sobering -- Mike and I would likely be dead right now if we lived in Zimbabwe.) A missionary friend of ours in France recently visited Zimbabwe as part of a World Vision visit, and here's what he said about the experience in a recent newsletter:

. . . We saw firsthand how World Vision is seeking to bring the whole gospel to an impoverished area, empowering local people to work together towards development and transformation of their communities. I was so touched and impressed by the work being done; by the wonderful, all-African staff; and by the response of the people. Everywhere we went there was singing, dancing, praying, thanking . . . What a stark difference from my world. In utter poverty these people find a way to rejoice! There is too much to say! The trip was nostalgic, alarming, exhilarating, humbling and awakening. "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

What a stark difference from our world here in the United States, too, in more ways than one. I share these stories about the children we sponsor not because we deserve praise or a pat on the back. We could certainly do more than we do. We don't sponsor these children to earn kudos with anyone, not even God. We do it because we can -- and because we have been blessed to be a blessing. We do it because it's a personal way we can respond to the stark needs across the world. And it's such a reality check for us when we get letters from the children or hear about experiences like our friend who traveled to Zimbabwe.

"If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like noonday." -- Isaiah 58:9-10

"He who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God." -- Proverbs 14:31

Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese . . .

I saw this story today on Yahoo! News and had to share it. The gist is that New York City is going to require fast-food restaurants to post calorie counts on menus beginning Sunday. (The requirement goes along with a ban on New York City restaurants using cooking oils with trans fats, which also takes effect Sunday.) The fast-food restaurants don't like the new law requiring calorie disclosure on menus, of course, and say it's because the calorie counts will make their menus impossible to read. I think people will be shocked to see just how many calories are in that bacon double cheeseburger. Maybe they'll take their appetites elsewhere. I know I would.

I stopped eating at most fast food restaurants a few years ago, but not because of the high calories, although that's reason enough to avoid them. The older I get, the more I just don't feel very well after eating at places like McDonald's or Taco Bell. I can't even eat a salad at McDonald's. I can still eat Wendy's single hamburgers, and I get cravings for Chick-Fil-A grilled chicken sandwiches. Turkey sandwiches at Subway treat my stomach kindly, but the rest of the fast-food chains make my tummy churn just thinking about eating their food.

Chains refuse to put calories on menus
By DAVID B. CARUSO, Associated Press Writer
NEW YORK - Don't expect to see the calorie count for Burger King's Double Whopper with cheese on the menu anytime soon.
Burger King, McDonald's and Wendy's are among the chains planning to defy New York City's new rule that they begin posting calories on menus Sunday.
Other big fast food eateries like Taco Bell and KFC aren't saying whether they will comply, but with just days to go until the deadline, the menu boards in their Big Apple restaurants remain unchanged.
All are hoping a New York Restaurant Association lawsuit in federal court will get the new regulation thrown out. Meanwhile, the city won't fine anyone for violating it until October.
"We are not trying to avoid providing this information to customers," said Wendy's spokesman Denny Lynch. He noted that the company has made nutritional information available for 30 years on fliers and posters.
However, New York is the first city in the country to require certain fast food restaurants to list calorie counts next to menu items in type that is at least as large as the price.
Lynch says adding all those numbers will make menus impossible to read.
"You'll either have to have a Times Square-sized menu board, or it could look like a bad day at the eye doctor's office," said Jack Whipple, president of the National Council of Chain Restaurants."
Fast food chains also say they have been unfairly singled because the new rule only applies to restaurants that serve standardized portions and offer nutritional information voluntarily.
Michael Jacobson of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a health advocacy group, had a different take:
"They are afraid that when people see these eye-popping calorie numbers, they might switch to a smaller size," he said. "They feel it is gong to hurt sales."
For the record, that Double Whopper with Cheese will run you 990 calories, or more than half the recommended daily calories for an adult woman.

I've become a recycling nut

A few months ago Mike and I started recycling our plastics, paper board, glass, aluminum, etc. We'd already been recycling our newspapers, but a story I wrote last fall about recycling efforts in Northern Colorado(http://ncbr.datajoe.com/app/ecom/pub_article_details.php?id=84157) opened my eyes a bit. Actually, it rekindled my desire to do my part and recycle what I could.

I used to live in Greeley, Colo., where I'd drop off my recycling at a grimy little place out in the country. I hated going there -- the guys who ran it kind of gave me the creeps -- but I was committed to recycling. I'm not an environmentalist by any means -- I have my doubts that global warming is our fault and that we can really do that much to stop it -- but recycling just makes sense to me. I mean, why throw that plastic water bottle away when it could be recycled into another plastic bottle? Why let it sit in a landfill FOREVER when it doesn't have to? I lived in an apartment in Greeley and therefore didn't have a recycling pick-up service. I had to seek a place out on my own and then collect all my recyclable items in bags and store them until I took them in.

I've moved a couple of times since I lived in Greeley and pretty much forgot about recycling. Every once in a while I'd heft the trash out to the trash bin and think about all the stuff in there that could be recycled.

The story I did for the Northern Colorado Business Report last November motivated me to start recycling again. For one, I did some research about landfills. (For a brief introduction to landfills, go to http://www.howstuffworks.com/landfill.htm.) Landfills are basically big holes in the ground where our trash gets buried. Much of what we throw away never decomposes or biodegrades, and it stays in that hole forever. On the East Coast, recycling is actually cheaper than land filling. Why? Because the landfills are full. Yes, some East Coast trash companies are hauling their trash out West because there's simply more room out here to bury the trash. I also learned that some counties in Colorado are really on the ball about recycling and have county-sponsored programs, such as Larimer County and Boulder County. Others are comparatively light years behind, such as Weld County, where I used to live. Land filling in Weld County -- the third largest county in the state that has a lot of wide open space -- is big business. Therefore recycling isn't very valued.

That brings me to Douglas County, where Mike and I currently live. Since we live in a condominium complex, there is no recycling pick-up. (That's a whole other can of worms I opened when doing research for the story. Apartment and condo complexes are hard to crack in terms of organizing recycling efforts. What happens is recycling bins get set up; residents ignore the signs that say "Recycling Only" and dump trash in there, and then the trash haulers, which are also the recycling companies, get fed up having to separate the trash from the recyclables. Therefore the recycling bins go away, and residents who want to recycle have to find other means to do the right thing.)

But I digress . . . anyway, doing the story turned me into a bit of a recycling nut. Mike is into it, too. Before we throw anything away we ask ourselves if it can be recycled. A few weeks after we started collecting our recyclables, I happened upon a few recycling bins behind a Catholic church. For six months, our little system worked perfectly. We collected the recyclables and would take them over to the bins behind the church every few weeks. Then one day a few weeks ago, we went to the church, and the recycling bins were gone!

There was a sign that said, "Recycling bins must be removed by order of the Douglas County Development Department." I was really mad. REALLY mad. I mean, here we are, two average citizens trying to do our part to help the environment, and the government says NO. I'm not sure what happened with the bins -- whether a neighbor complained, whether the recycling company didn't pick up the stuff often enough or what.

I was mad enough to want to abandon our recycling efforts entirely. But something held me back. I did some research on the Internet and found that there aren't many places you can drop off recyclable items in our area. Sure, if we lived in a house we could pay the trash company to pick recycling up. We could drive 20 miles to Commerce City to a drop-off center. There are plenty of places to take phone books, car batteries, electronics or appliances. But I wanted a place to take everyday stuff.

Today, I found it. And it made my day. Seriously. The El Jebel Shriners have set up recycling bins at various locations across the Denver area, and I found one in an elementary-school parking lot close to home. While I dumped our stuff in there, I half expected someone from the school to come out and tell me I couldn't use the bins. But no one stopped me.

I sure hope this new recycling location turns out to be a good one. I hope the bins don't disappear on us. In the meantime, I think I'm going to call Douglas County -- heck, I may even try to find out who my county commissioner is and call him or her-- and encourage them to start a county-wide recycling drop-off center. For heaven's sake, recycling isn't a new concept. It's the norm on the East and West coasts, and many universities across the country, including ones in Colorado, have campus-wide recycling programs.

To me, it's the biggest no-brainer thing you can do to reduce waste and help the environment, minor though it may seem to the individuals doing it.