Adviser Update
I
n his recently released digital
book, “Searchlights and Sunglasses,” author Eric Newton,
journalist and senior adviser to
the Knight Foundation president,
calls for the digital transformation
of journalism and journalism education. A joint production of the
John S. and James L. Knight
Foundation and the Reynolds
Journalism Institute, “Searchlights and Sunglasses” is
designed in HTML5 and is available free at searchlightsandsunglasses.org. In this edited Q and
A, Newton offers insights into the
book’s message for future journalists.
Q
Q:
A: Perhaps we will be saying
that students in high school
are the future rather than “high
school journalism.” Whatever we
say will depend at least partly
upon decisions made today by
those involved in high school
journalism. Since today anyone
can commit an act of journalism,
teaching everyone digital media
literacy, news literacy and
civics literacy couldn’t be more
important.
But two-thirds of the high
school journalism programs are
still print-oriented. That doesn’t
make sense when the entire
student body is using mobile
media to create digital lives in
cyberspace. Unless high schools
figure out how to be part of social
and mobile media, and ride that
wave to better educati ۈ