Journalism 3235D: DIGITAL Journalism (Multimedia) – WINTER 2024

Time: Wednesdays 8:35 a.m. – 11:25 a.m. Eastern Time
Dates: Jan 10 – Feb 14, 2024
Time: 08:35 – 11:25 Building: RH 4114
Instructor
David McKie Email: davidmckiec@gmail.com
Phone: 613-290-7380 Office hours: By appointment

Photography instructor
David Kawai davidkawai@gmail.com
613-884-1623

TA
Alex Dines
alexdines@cmail.carleton.ca

Course Methods
This is a workshop course that offered in person, subject to Carleton University COVID-19 policy. Full details will be available on Brightspace.

Course Description
JOUR 3235 is a reporting course in which students produce works of journalism intended for publication on Capital Current (https://capitalcurrent.ca). The course is divided into two six-week segments. In this segment, we will build upon some of the digital skills acquired in second year and develop some additional ones. The focus will be upon data and photography.

You an also find this syllabus on Brightspace.

Course Objectives
Students who successfully complete this course should be able to:
• recognize the importance that visual elements can have to a news story;
• recognize the importance that data can play in journalism;
• shoot and edit high quality photographs; and
• produce journalistic work that incorporates visualized data.

Online Resources
There is no textbook for this course segment. Resources, readings, instructions, handouts and examples will be made available throughout the course via Brightspace.

Assignments
Your final grade for this course will be calculated based on the grades you earn on your assignments as follows. (Keep in mind that the assignments for the multimedia half of the course make up 50% of the overall course weighting. The other 50% comes from the reporting half. Also, as noted later in the outline, you must achieve a passing grade in each of the six-week segments of this course to achieve a passing grade for the course as a whole.)

Visualized data: 15%
Data story: 30%
Photo essay: 25%
Quizzes: 10%
Small assignment(s): 10%
Professionalism: 10%

Visualized data
This is the graphic that will accompany the data story. This graphic will be produced using Datawrapper, according to best practices outlined during the course, and will be included in your data story.

Data story
The data story is a piece of written journalism, produced in teams of two people, that must follow these guidelines:
• roughly 700-800 words in length;
• submitted with no spelling or grammar mistakes and according to CP style;
• includes at leat three human sources;
• includes no fewer than two pieces of visualized data (one from each team member produced as the ‘visualized data’ assignment);
• includes at least one relevant photograph or image;
• includes at least one hyperlink (URL) to external source of information.

Photo essay
This is a series of between five and seven photos that tell us a story about somebody in your community. The photo essay is an individual assignment. In order to maintain safety during the COVID-19 pandemic, students can choose to profile somebody in their household or within their safety ‘bubble.’ More details will be available on Brightspace.

Quizzes
There will be a number of quizzes that follow instructional videos and/or readings. Quizzes are generally made up of five multiple-choice questions and will be done eitther through Brightspace or emailed to me. The final grade for the quizzes will be calculated as the percentage of the total number of questions answered correctly. Please note that once quizzes are closed, they cannot be taken or re-taken.

Small assignments
There will be smaller assignments on data visualization and photo editing. These assignments will not be graded but treated as either complete or incomplete. If they are incomplete, this will deduct percentage points from the maximum grade that can be achieved in the course.

Professionalism
Professionalism covers a wide range of practices, including attending class, contributing to class discussion, and working constructively with others.

Final course grades
JOUR 3235 is composed of two six-week segments. An overall grade of C or better must be obtained in 3235 in order to proceed to the next level of reporting courses. A grade of F in one of the segments of the course will result in an automatic overall grade of F for the course as a whole. If you receive a grade less than a C (D-to C-) in one or both of the segments, the final overall grade will not be higher than a C-. This means that you will be ineligible to proceed to the next level of reporting courses. If the above grade conditions are met, the final grade for the course will be the average of the two segments.
Questions or appeals about your grade on assignments or other graded components of the course should be raised with the instructor no later than seven business days after the grade has been issued, as explained in the university’s undergraduate academic regulations (3.3.4 and 3.3.5, https://calendar.carleton.ca/undergrad/regulations/academicregulationsoftheuniversity/regulations-for-degree-students). Your final course grade is based on grades earned throughout the term on the assignments and other graded components listed in the syllabus. This means requests to raise an overall course grade at the end of the term or year cannot be considered.
Standing in a course is determined by the course instructor subject to the approval of the Faculty Dean. This means that grades submitted by an instructor may be subject to revision. No grades are final until they have been approved by the Dean.

Grading criteria
Professionalism matters here, as it will throughout your careers. This is a professional school, so students will be expected to meet professional standards in both assignments and conduct.
Regarding assignments, meeting professional standards means completing them according to the criteria outlined in class and in the course outline, as well as submitting them on time. If you are unclear about the requirements for any assignment, it is your responsibility to ask the instructors or the teaching assistants for clarification well before the assignment is due.
If you expect an exceptional grade, you will need to produce exceptional work. Letter grades will be awarded to each assignment within the following range:

An A range grade will be awarded to excellent work. Generally this means that written assignments:
• are presented in clear, well written prose, free of spelling, style and grammatical errors;
• include the requisite number of sources, presented in an appropriate context;
• demonstrate a strong understanding of the relevant issues; and
• are produced with high ethical standards.
A B range grade will be awarded to solid work. Generally this means that written assignments may be lacking at least one of the elements required for A range work listed above.

Grades of C or D will be awarded to sub-standard work. Generally this means that written assignments are lacking most of the elements required for A range work listed above.

An F will be given to assignments that are late, contain significant errors of fact, fail to meet the requirements of the assignment, and/or seriously violate the School’s Ethics and Professional Standards.

Professional Conduct

Meeting professional standards includes regular, meaningful participation; accepting responsibility for mistakes; and treating your classmates, teaching assistants, technical support staff and instructors with respect, even under the pressure of deadline.

Statement on Plagiarism
The Carleton University Senate defines plagiarism as “presenting, whether intentionally or not, the ideas, expression of ideas or work of others as one’s own.” This can include:

• reproducing or paraphrasing portions of someone else’s published or unpublished material, regardless of the source, and presenting these as one’s own without proper citation or reference to the original source;
• submitting a take-home examination, essay, laboratory report or other assignment written, in whole or in part, by someone else;
• using ideas or direct, verbatim quotations, or paraphrased material, concepts, or ideas without appropriate acknowledgment in any academic assignment;
• using another’s data or research findings;
• failing to acknowledge sources through the use of proper citations when using another’s works and/or failing to use quotation marks;
• handing in “substantially the same piece of work for academic credit more than once without prior written permission of the course instructor in which the submission occurs.”

Plagiarism is a serious offence that cannot be resolved directly by the course’s instructor. The Associate Dean of the Faculty conducts a rigorous investigation, including an interview with the student, when an instructor suspects a piece of work has been plagiarized. Penalties are not trivial. They can include a final grade of “F” for the course.”

You should familiarize yourself with Carleton University’s policy on Academic Integrity, which can be found by following the link below: https://carleton.ca/registrar/academic-integrity

Ethics and Professional Standards

This is a professional school, and you’ll be held to professional standards in both assignments and conduct. As a student of journalism, you must read and adhere to the School’s policies.

Our ethics policy sets out the rules of behaviour that you, as students and journalists, are expected to follow as you carry out your assignments for this course. One of the rules, for example, makes clear that you must not interview relatives or friends for your story, except in rare and special circumstances and with the advance permission of the instructor.

Our publishing policy requires certain authorizations before journalistic coursework can be published outside of the class. In addition, your sources must understand that any assignments they are associated with may be published outside of class.

Our policy on electronic media usage requires that you follow copyright regulations with respect to your use of all materials culled from the Internet. For example, you cannot use any pictures you find online in your assignments unless you get written permission from the copyright holder to use them and submit it to the instructor.

Undergraduates can find all three policies on this page: https://carleton.ca/sjc/journalism/undergraduate-studies/resources-current-undergraduate-students/

You are expected to be familiar with these policies and apply them to your work. Failure to abide by them will adversely affect your standing in the course.

Carleton E-mail Accounts
All email communication to students from the Communication and Media Studies Program will be via official Carleton university e-mail accounts and/or Brightspace. As important course and University information are distributed this way, it is the student’s responsibility to monitor their Carleton and Brightspace accounts.

Course Copyright
Classroom teaching and learning activities, including lectures, discussions, presentations, etc., by both instructors and students, are copyright protected and remain the intellectual property of their respective author(s). All course materials, including PowerPoint presentations, outlines, and other materials, are also protected by copyright and remain the intellectual property of their respective author(s).

Students registered in the course may take notes and make copies of course materials for their own educational use only. Students are not permitted to reproduce or distribute lecture notes and course materials publicly for commercial or non-commercial purposes without express written consent from the copyright holder(s).

Session Recording
Web conferencing sessions in this course may be recorded and made available only to those within the class. Sessions may be recorded to enable access to students with internet connectivity problems, who are based in different time zone, and/or who have conflicting commitments. If students wish not to be recorded, they need to leave your camera and microphone turned off.

You will be notified at the start of the session when the recording will start, and Zoom will always notify meeting participants that a meeting is being recorded. It is not possible to disable this notification.

Please note that recordings are protected by copyright. The recordings are for your own educational use, but you are not permitted to publish to third party sites, such as social media sites and course materials sites.

You may be expected to use the video and/or audio and/or chat during web conferencing sessions for participation and collaboration. If you have concerns about being recorded, please email me directly so we can discuss these.

COVID-19 and the Classroom
All members of the Carleton community are required to follow COVID-19 prevention measures and all mandatory public health requirements.

If you feel ill or exhibit COVID-19 symptoms while on campus or in class, please leave campus immediately, self-isolate, and complete the mandatory symptom reporting tool.

All members of the Carleton community are required to follow guidelines regarding safe movement and seating on campus. In order to avoid congestion, allow all previous occupants to fully vacate a classroom before entering.

For the most recent information about Carleton’s COVID-19 response and required measures, please see the University’s COVID-19 webpage and review the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs). Should you have additional questions after reviewing, please contact covidinfo@carleton.ca.

Please note that failure to comply with University policies and mandatory public health requirements, and endangering the safety of others are considered misconduct under the Student Rights and Responsibilities Policy. Failure to comply with Carleton’s COVID-19 procedures may lead to supplementary action involving Campus Safety and/or Student Affairs.

Equity and Diversity
Discussion and debate play valuable roles in online and in-person classes. Differing views should focus on the content of the material and efforts should be made to understand how a person’s lived experience might or ought to shape their perspectives. Racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, and ableist language will not be tolerated.

Carleton’s journalism program is committed to creating a welcoming, stimulating, professional and creative environment for our increasingly diverse student body. We commit to eliminating racism against Racialized and Indigenous people as well as inequities or other barriers based on ethnicity, nationality, religion, gender expression, sexual orientation or ability. We hope our program’s commitment to anti-racism and anti-oppression practices will benefit all of our students while they are here and that it will foster a wider culture of equity and inclusion in newsrooms of the future as they respond to and report on an increasingly diverse society.

The Permanent Working Group was established to help keep the journalism school on track with structural changes that aim to make the school a safe and welcoming environment for all students. The group also provides specific direction and advice to the journalism program committee and head on matters pertaining to equity and inclusion. Students wishing to propose programmatic ideas or who have concerns may contact us directly via https://carleton.ca/sjc/journalism/equity-and-inclusion/permanent-working-group.

The Department of Equity and Inclusive Communities fosters the development of an inclusive and transformational university culture where individual distinctiveness and a sense of belonging for every member drive excellence in research, teaching, learning and working at Carleton. Students with complaints may direct them to the Department of Equity and Inclusive Communities via https://carleton.ca/equity.

The journalism program has a student-led Association for Equity and Inclusion in Journalism. Its mission is to make the journalism school a safe(r) space for Black, Indigenous, and students of colour, 2SLGBTQ+ students and students with disabilities/disabled students. More information about the association can be found at https://carleton.ca/sjc/journalism/equity-and-inclusion/student-association.

Additional Student Support

The Centre for Student Academic Support (CSAS) is a centralized collection of learning support services designed to help students achieve their goals and improve their learning both inside and outside the classroom. CSAS offers academic assistance with course content, academic writing and skills development. Visit CSAS on the 4th floor of MacOdrum Library or online at https://carleton.ca/csas.

Requests for Academic Accommodation
Carleton University is committed to providing access to the educational experience to promote academic accessibility for all individuals.

Academic accommodation refers to educational practices, systems and support mechanisms designed to accommodate diversity and difference. The purpose of accommodation is to enable students to perform the essential requirements of their academic programs. At no time does academic accommodation undermine or compromise the learning objectives that are established by the academic authorities of the University.

You may need special arrangements to meet your academic obligations during the term. For an accommodation request, the processes are as follows:

Pregnancy obligation
Please contact your instructor with any requests for academic accommodation during the first two weeks of class, or as soon as possible after the need for accommodation is known to exist. For more details, visit the Equity Services website: https://carleton.ca/equity/wp-content/uploads/Student-Guide-to-Academic-Accommodation.pdf.

Religious obligation
Please contact your instructor with requests for academic accommodation during the first two weeks of class, or as soon as possible after the need for accommodation is known to exist. For more details, visit the Equity Services website: https://carleton.ca/equity/wp-content/uploads/Student-Guide-to-Academic-Accommodation.pdf.

Academic Accommodations for Students with Disabilities
If you have a documented disability requiring academic accommodations in this course, please contact the Paul Menton Centre for Students with Disabilities (PMC) at 613-520-6608 or pmc@carleton.ca for a formal evaluation or contact your PMC coordinator to send your instructor your Letter of Accommodation at the beginning of the term. You must also contact the PMC no later than two weeks before the first in-class scheduled test or exam requiring accommodation (if applicable). After requesting accommodation from PMC, meet with your instructor as soon as possible to ensure accommodation arrangements are made. For more details, visit the Paul Menton Centre website.

Survivors of Sexual Violence
As a community, Carleton University is committed to maintaining a positive learning, working and living environment where sexual violence will not be tolerated and where survivors are supported through academic accommodations as per Carleton’s Sexual Violence Policy. For more information about the services available at the university and to obtain information about sexual violence and/or support, visit: https://carleton.ca/equity/focus/sexual-violence-prevention-survivor-support.

Accommodation for Student Activities
Carleton University recognizes the substantial benefits, both to the individual student and for the university, that result from a student participating in activities beyond the classroom experience. Reasonable accommodation must be provided to students who compete or perform at the national or international level. Please contact your instructor with any requests for academic accommodation during the first two weeks of class, or as soon as possible after the need for accommodation is known to exist. https://carleton.ca/senate/wp-content/uploads/Accommodation-for-Student-Activities-1.pdf.

For more information on academic accommodation, please contact the departmental administrator or visit: https://students.carleton.ca/course-outline.

JOUR3235 (multimedia): Week One

Class recording
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiVWCYEC-fI

Jan 10

Today we are going to look at how data can be useful in reporting and storytelling. We’ll also look at some of the more common sources of useful data.

We are also going to work on an in-class exercise using Excel. There will be a small assignment due that we’ll start (and possibly complete) in class.

What you will learn

Introductions and course overview;
A general discussion about data and how it is used in stories;
An introduction to the concept of open data;
Exercises with datasets from Ottawa’s open-data portal and Statistics Canada website;
Learning how to download datasets sort, and filter to begin seeing general patterns;
An introduction to pivot tables, if we have time;
Lookahead to next week.

Links

There were were 14 homicides in Ottawa in 2023, slightly lower than 2022.pdf

Ottawa police launch interactive map for crime statistics

Ottawa Police – Crime Map (Year-to-Date)
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/7db5b7d590754c9988d89643542ba646/

Ottawa Police – Crime Map (Year End) 2018-2023
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/e5a8c6d852f242758355702fa041c012/page/Page/?views=Filter

Ottawa Police year-end and year-to-datasets
http://www.davidmckie.com/CrimeMap_YTD_Jan 1, 2023-Jan 2, 2024_Year_End_2018-2022.zip

City of Ottawa neighbourhood map
https://open.ottawa.ca/datasets/32fe76b71c5e424fab19fec1f180ec18/explore

StatCan release schedules

Statistics Canada’s data tables

How to use Statistics Canada’s data tables
https://www.statcan.gc.ca/en/sc/video/howto

Police-reported crime statistics in Canada, 2022
https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/230727/dq230727b-eng.htm

2023_UCR_Manual_EN_final.pdf

Criminal Code (justice.gc.ca)

Data

Ottawa_Year-to-date2018-Jan8,2023_StatsCanPropertyCrime_Ottawa_2018-2022.zip

Assignments

Repeat the exercises in Excel that we reviewed in class using the class recording as an instructional video.

JOUR3235 (multimedia): Week Two

Jan 17

Class recording
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsNFIddRHYU

What you will learn

Mini-test based on last week’s Excel exercises;
Pivot tables using more hate-crime data and general crime data;
Downloading Datawrapper;
Discussion of the story assignment;
Lookahead to next week.

JOUR3235 (multimedia): Week Three

Class recording
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oVn6v4E8ig

Jan 24

What you will learn

A review of last week’s pivot table exercises;
Creating tables in Datawrapper;
Discussion of progress on stories;
Lookahead to next week.

Links

TTC Wrapped 2023 – Toronto Star interactive
https://bit.ly/48DzrHu

City of Toronto open-data catalogue for the TTC
https://open.toronto.ca/catalogue/?search=TTC&sort=score%20desc

City of Ottawa open-data cataglogue for OC Transpo
https://open.ottawa.ca/search?q=OC%20Transpo&sort=-modified

Jewish students say they feel unsafe as reports of antisemitic hate rise in Ottawa
https://capitalcurrent.ca/jewish-students-say-they-feel-unsafe-as-reports-of-antisemitic-hate-rise-in-ottawa/

Hate on the rise: Ontario sees increase in police-reported crimes
https://capitalcurrent.ca/hate-on-the-rise-ontario-sees-increase-in-police-reported-crimes/#

Nail file: Ottawa salons failing inspections at high rates
https://capitalcurrent.ca/nail-file-ottawa-salons-failing-inspections-at-high-rates/

Ottawa-Gatineau property crime at an all-time high, most recent statistics show
https://capitalcurrent.ca/ottawa-gatineau-property-crime-at-an-all-time-high-most-recent-statistics-show/

Public health data shows food service inspection failures are rising in Ottawa
https://capitalcurrent.ca/food-service-inspection-failures-are-on-the-rise-in-ottawa-but-why/

Examples of visualizations in Datawrapper
http://www.davidmckie.com/category/digi-1examples/

The graduation gap hurting homeless students
https://publicintegrity.org/education/unhoused-and-undercounted/graduation-gap-hurting-homeless-students/

Headline Analyzer Tool: Write Better Headlines
https://capitalizemytitle.com/

Instructional video(s)

Creating a table in Datawrapper using cannabis data – Aneurin Bosley
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qi5tJyqaeTA

Additional resources

HillNotes
https://hillnotes.ca/

Assignment

If you haven’t already done so, read Nathan Yau’s chapter — referenced under the previous week’s “assignment” section to prepare for next week’s quiz.

Your data story (the story itself and the graphic in Datawrapper) is due by 17:00 on Jan 29.
As discussed in class, if you need an extra day, please let us know. But the absolute deadline for the draft in Google doc format is 19:00 Tuesday evening, which will give you enough time to encorporate our feedback before next Wednesday’s class.

JOUR3235 (multimedia): Week Four

Jan 31

Class recording
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjvNlxacR1A

What you will learn

Dataviz quiz on Nathan Yau’s chapter;
Review of key items in WordPress (CapitalCurrent.ca);
Ways of thinking about the data you want to visualize and discussion of techniques discussed in Nathan Yau’s chapter;
Get stories and data visualizations into WordPress;
Lookahead to photo stories.

Resources

Headline Analyzer Tool: Write Better Headlines
https://capitalizemytitle.com/

Capitalize My Title
https://bit.ly/47GDulS

Capital Current WordPress Pagination.pdf

Capital Current Production Style Guide-F20.pdf

Cropping and ratios.pptx

Next week’s photo assignment

Have a photoshoot with someone you know in their home/living space using daylight as the primary light source.

Submit your best image in a Word doc with a photo caption that conforms to CP Style to David McKie AND David Kawai by email on or before MONDAY next week. We will briefly review all of the images in class to give helpful feedback and direction.

(When selecting someone to photograph, be sure you have access to them over the next two weeks, as you will be making more pictures for your Photo Story due in two weeks.)

One more rule: Shoot photos with a landscape/horizontal orientation. No verticals.

Optional photo assignment hints

Try to make wide, medium and close up frames and see which ones you think worked best at the end of the shoot.
If you don’t feel confident in posing your subject, think about ways they might be doing something (reading, yoga, cleaning, texting, gaming, playing with cat).
The photo cheesy or silly. We don’t want to see people hamming it up for the camera.
You can refer to the attached images (made by your colleagues last term) for inspiration.
I made a photo of a page in my CP Stylebook to show you an example of a correct CP Style caption. The one that names Stephen Harper is the example you should refer to. Note that there are two sentences, and that the first describes the action while the second describes the story context. Note that the location comes before the date at the end of the first sentence.

Photo examples

Watch the following videos before the next class

Video tutorial: Camera mechanics

Video tutorial: Basic editing in PhotoShop

Video: Aspect ratios and cropping

JOUR3235 (multimedia): Week Five

Feb 7

Class recording
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVFLhIzGY4Y

What you will learn

Quiz and quiz review (camera mechanics and PhotoShop);
Review portrait assignment;
Lookahead to photo stories.

Photo Assignment

Photo Story – David Kawai’s assignment for David McKie’s class – Due Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024

Take a photojournalist approach in documenting your subject in at least 3 locations. Submit between 5-7 final images with CP Style captions that uniquely describe each image. Your subject’s face must be reasonably visible in every image.

All photos must be landscape (horizontal) orientation. No verticals. Save your photos so that they are each smaller than 1MB.

Use Microsoft Word to organize and submit your photos, with one photo and caption per page. Therefore, if you are submitting 5 photos, then the document should be 5 pages.

Name your Word document using the following format (using your own name, please):

“Kawai, David – Photo Story”

Final version due END OF DAY on Wednesday, Feb. 14. However, in class next week, you will have one final consultation with David Kawai about selections, edits and sequencing of images. So, bring all your best photos and even the outtakes for review.

Please submit your Word doc by email as an attachment (NOT a link, please) to David Kawai, David McKie and Alex Dines:

davidkawai@gmail.com
davidmckiec@gmail.com
AlexDines@cmail.carleton.ca

Use the same naming format as I’ve requested for the Word file in the subject heading of the email, please.

If you are stuck for any reason, email or reach me pretty much any time (613.884.1623). Text and we’ll arrange a time to chat.

Hints:

Better captions and better planning = easier pictures.
Don’t be afraid to take lots of photos in the pursuit of finding a good one.
Include a mix of posed and action style photos.
Look for window light (but you don’t always need to show the window in your photo).
Make sure your lens is clean.
Think in terms of making a mix of wide, medium and close-ups.
Communicate with your subject before and during photography.