Students Say ‘Sure’ and Get the News Reported

 

Home page of MMU Times, thanks to some new students getting involved.

Advising an online student news site has been a journey. The Mount Mercy Times at Mount Mercy University, where I teach, gave up a print newspaper last year.

I’m sure it was the right move. We were throwing away too many printed copies, and finding a newspaper in Iowa with a press to handle our small press run was becoming too difficult—too much cost, too much waste, too much hassle. Thus, now we’re the online Mount Mercy Times.

The biggest disadvantage of that is, even if the printed papers were mostly tossed, they were a visible reminder to the campus that the Times exists, and the need to fill a print edition pushed the students to organize, collaborate and get things done. Sadly, with no print deadline to push us, the Times produced far less journalism last year compared to years before.

It did not disappear, but it hasn’t yet found its legs as an online news source.

Still, today was a hopeful day. Mount Mercy was set to announce a new football program today, a big deal—but one of my few staff students (we’re still building the staff for this year), the sports editor, had class at the same time as the announcement was being made.

However, in a general education communication class I teach, there is a student who had expressed some interest in writing for the MMU Times this semester. The Oral Communication class ended at 11:20 a.m.—would this student be willing to rush over to the Plaster Athletic Complex, take a camera with him, and cover his first story?

He thought about it for a second. He has a science test this afternoon. But, heck, he had a few minutes. “Sure,” he said.

So, Jonas shot a picture of me to get used to the camera, and then took off. But a few minutes after class, he and Lillian, another student from the class, saw me walking across the Rohde Family Plaza, heading for the library. “Professor Sheller!” Lillian yelled. “Where is the ceremony?”

At the Plaster Athletic Complex. A quarter mile from where we stood. In 10 minutes. Jonas looked a little doubtful. “Can you give him a ride?” I asked Lillian. I would have offered, but I ride a bike to work and Jonas would not fit on my bike's front handlebars (besides, I had to meet a student in the library and could not go to the ceremony myself anyway).

She thought for a second. “Sure,” she said.

Sometimes, “sure” is the best thing you can have a student say.

Jonas, chauffeured by Lillian, covered his first news story—a major one, as it turned out, that ended up on the top of the Times home page.

Jonas Gutierrez, MMU students, writes his first story for the MMU Times, I hope he writes many more.

Not all my problems with the story were over, however. As anybody in the news business can tell you, shooting images and writing a story is only the start. Who would edit the story?

As it happened, Keira was in the Times office to take a mid-term exam in a PR writing class. Would she be willing to have me, both her professor and the Times faculty advisor, have her take a brief break to read and copy edit a story Jonas had just finished typing?

“Sure,” she said. Well, I don’t recall if she used that exact word, but it seemed to be the word of the day, and in any case, she agreed and did it so she said “sure” in spirit.

Keira Carper in the MMU Times office, where today she edited her first Times story. In the middle of a mid-term exam.

The ceremony started at 11:30 a.m. I put together a shell of a story based on a statement posted by MMU, so Jonas could have a head start entering his information. When he came to the Times newsroom in the library at about 12:15 p.m., he said “here is the camera, now I have to go take my exam.”

Great—but any chance you could add your quotes and finish the story before your exam? He didn’t exactly say “sure,” but I’m sure he meant it, because, again, he paused for a second, thought about it, and then agreed to do it. The story was drafted by 1. By 1:30, Keira had edited the story. By 2 or so, it was posted to the MMU Times web site.

Cheerleaders at ceremony. One of the images made for MMU Times by Jonas Gutierrez.

Well, reporting news on the same day is one advantage of being an online news source, over being a paper printed twice a month. Nevertheless, it was a roller-coaster of a day for me—would we have a story? Would we have images? Early this morning, it seemed like the stars would not align, but here we were in the afternoon with a news web site updated.

There’s more to come. Another student shot more images at the ceremony, and I’m sure we’ll update the Times web site with a longer photo gallery from this big day as soon as I get my hands on the Times camera that she used. And our sports editor will be collecting campus reaction for a second-day reaction story on the news.

Still, score one for student news media at MMU. They pushed themselves, and scored a sports news touchdown today. And may many more students say “sure” and keep student news alive at Mount Mercy University.