Kim Pearson
Class: 153 Bliss Hall
TF 3:30 - 4:50
Office Hours:
MR  3:30-4:50 or by appointment
Office: 217 Bliss Hall
x2692

PUBLICATIONS AND RESOURCES
The Signal
unbound
Journalism Resource Page
New Jersey Online: Links to local newspapers

What is Professional Writing, and how is it different from Journalism? 

Professional writers use communications media to help a client clarify its identity,  and project its image to specific audiences. Professional writers are involved in both the strategy and tactics of business communications. As TCNJ '72 alum and corporate communications director Stuart Z. Goldstein, argues, "Companies are looking for communicators who can integrate their activities with the firm's business strategy and who see themselves as catalysts for change. These seasoned communicators will have experience across the communications disciplines and will know how to leverage the pieces to influence outcomes and affect results." (Information Preparedness: An Integrated Model for Communication in the Information Age)

Professional Writing is designed to solve a specific problem or provide information in a way that supports the client's relationship with specific publics. Thus saith Goldstein:  "Writing effectively is not an academic exercise; it is a business imperative."

Professional writers and editors need the same writing and editing skills as journalists. To quote Goldstein again, today's business writing is much more "journalistic."  That's particularly true with the proliferation of e-mail business communications. However, professional writers have to understand the industry for which they are writing, and they also have to be technically sophisticated. They don't have to be web design or desktop publishing experts, but they have to know enough to create basic documents, and they need to understand how to deploy these technologies effectively.  

	Assistant Media Liaison  Launches, promotes, writes, refreshes, and works on daily upkeep of the online Press Center; Develops, coordinates, guides, and promotes media strategies for online and computer-oriented media initiatives; Assists in providing counsel to strategic issue teams on the best media strategies, tactics, and messages to use for promotion of strategic issues. Serves as an expert on the web for promotion of strategic issues and organizes appropriate duties for media promotion....
	Assistant Editor Duties will include copyediting and proofreading articles for style and grammar. Additional responsibilities include overseeing production process from raw author files to typeset proofs to blue lines, and preparing materials for Web site.  Knowledge of Macintosh OS 8.6, QuarkXPress 4.1, and Microsoft Excel a plus, but will train.
	Technical Writer/Editor Produces technical end-user documentation (manuals and guides), training material, and online help systems software products, using desktop publishing technology, graphics programs, and help authoring tools. Writes, edits, formats, and produces final camera-ready copy and/or publication-ready (.pdf) files for manuals, as well as completed help files.

In professional writing, journalism and other communications, images, graphics and hypertext have expanded (and in some cases, overtaken) linear storytelling methods. This affects the way professional communicators work, their career prospects, and the nature of the career preparation aspiring professional writers should undertake. If you're curious here's an article that further explores the philosophical implications of these new realities. Be forewarned that it may seem a little confusing and theoretical.

UNDERGRADUATE	GRADUATE
Harvard University (Summer School) Purdue University San Francisco State University University of California at Santa Barbara University of Maine University of Massachussets University of Victoria West Virginia University	Towson State University University of Massachussets at Dartmouth

At the end of this semester, you will:

1. Be able to discuss the goals, purposes and media employed by professional writers.

2. Be able to articulate the principles of ethical business communications. 

3. Be able to create: 

1. A simple web page, using HTML coding

2. A business presentation using Power Point

3. A newsworthy press release written in Associated Press style

4. A business memorandum recommending an ethical, practical solution to a hypothetical client problem

5. A standard business report.

Since you've learned to answer more concisely, I have another question. I'm a journalism major -- why do I need to know this stuff?

1. While about 28 percent of our graduates become newspaper reporters and copyeditors after graduation, 72 percent do not. This course is designed to familiarize you with some of the other ways in which one can make a living as a writer.

2. The work that journalists do, and the skill set they need, is broadening. Increasingly, the story that is created for print ends up on a web page, on the radio, or as part of a streaming media broadcast. Further, a 1999 study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism suggest that professional communications skills are increasingly important in the newsroom. A study of the way news is framed found that at national newspaper, particularly, news decisions are the result of internal communications, and that the resulting stories are more likely to be interpretive and thematic, rather than inverted-pyramid style. (Framing the News. The bottom line is that whether you plan to be a print reporter or a public relations writer, the skills that you will acquire in this course are relevant.

Enough, already. Sorry I asked. So I suppose you want to tell me alll about all the experience you've had in this field..

Not really, but if you're curious, you can look at my resume on-line here.. It's fairly current.

Companion website Telling the Story: Writing for Print, Broadcast and Online Media Newswatch

Headphones for computer

PC-compatible disks

Survey design technical report, Due: September 14: 10%