Elephants and Asses: They're All the Same

Despite the buzz of the upcoming presidential elections on the news, Wittenberg students seem less than raring to go in terms of rooting for their preferred candidate. This couldn't have been more obvious during the interviews we did in class on Tuesday, where person after person repeated the same phrase: "Students just don't care". Even the ones that said they supported a particular candidate claimed they were either "less informed than they'd like to be" or that they weren't terrible involved with the current on-goings of the campaign.

This surprised me greatly, since I recall the 2008 elections being a big deal my Junior year in high school. In fact, I remember kids getting into all-out fights in the halls just because one person supported a candidate that they considered a "douche". Ah, the days of Catholic high school. But no such quarrels are being fought at Wittenberg University; at least not ones that you hear (or care) about anyway.

Perhaps this is simply a sign that people as a whole have become relatively detached from the political world.  The amount of students who either considered themselves independent voters or who claimed that they felt strongly towards neither candidate consisted of half the group I interviewed. The other half expressed support for one or the other, but also stated that they felt that they weren't as informed about the election as they'd like to be.

I really felt that college students would be more aware of these things, but I suppose I was wrong. Not that I can blame them. With classes, work, and social commitments, something as grim and negative as domestic politics can really put a damper on one's day. As for whether or not students will begin to pay closer attention by the time the Novemeber elections roll around is still to be decided.

First Story

So last Thursday in class we, as individuals, selected ideas for our first story after several group discussions. Honestly, I don't think I could have flushed out anything decent without the opportunity to bounce ideas off of everyone else in the room. I mean, I had a fledgling idea of what I wanted to do, but it had no substance. I didn't know where I wanted to go with it. But now I'm full of ideas.

My first story for Advanced News Writing is going to be about school drop-outs. No, not the high-school ones, the college ones. I want to find out more about these kids who come to Witt for no more than a single semester and then suddenly jump ship. Some of these kids even have scholarships provided by the school but even that isn't enough to keep them sometimes. Honestly, this is something that I've always wondered about, so I'm really excited to find out the details.

Then again, I'm also nervous because this is my first story after all. Yeah, I wrote stuff for Beginning Journalism, but I'm going to assume that the grading for this class will be a bit tougher. I usually treat my first class assignments as experiments. After getting a feel of what the teacher expects of me, I can easily work to improve on my next project. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to try my best with this story.

-Fran

First Post

Last year during my Sophomore year in college I decided that I wanted to use my English major to become an editor. I wanted to help other people get their works published and spend my time reading their thoughts, their stories, and their hopes for success rather than create my own because let's face it, I'm not exactly into forced writing for myself as much as I thought. But I still love reading, and my wonderful advisor, Darcy Fallon, suggested that a Journalism minor was the way to go in the path to my career of choice.

So here I am in Advanced News Writing 321, hoping that I'll be able to gain the experience I need. Upon first glance, the syllabus seems kind of intense. Then again, I usually tend to make everything look way more difficult than it actually is. But the professor seems like he'll be a real help in guiding us through all this, and I really did enjoy my beginning Journalism class with Darcy so maybe this will be just the amount of work I need to get a feel of things.

Then again, the number 321 when applied to a class is pretty intimidating. I've never taken a 300 level course at Wittenberg before, though I know I'll be taking more in the future. 300 implies a lot of work, a lot of studying, and a lot of time and effort put into getting a good grade. But this is a class I need for my minor and it's a subject that I'm interested in so I should probably just suck it up and get over it.

Regardless, I'm looking forward to listening to everyone's ideas and reading their stories. Like I said, I love reading and I've got no problem having newspaper readings as required homework. I'm still 50/50 on the class as a whole, but here's hoping this turns out to be a good decision on my part.

-Fran