Current Events Reportage

Over the course of the semester, each of you will track the recent developments in a particular area of the news – the war on terror, world economy, immigration, or the environment.  The goal is to develop awareness, insight, and opinions on what is going on in the world.  

Your task is to locate a story in the news that interests you and write a blog post about it.  That blog post should contain three things: 1. A link to a recent news article, 2. A summary of the information and opinion contained therein, 3. Your own perspective on the subject.  These blog posts will serve as the topic of discussion for our first twenty minutes of class.

War on Terror (Sept 12, Oct 8, Nov 5)

World Economy (Sept 17, Oct 10, Nov 12)

Immigration (Sept 19, Oct 15, Nov 21)

Environment (Sept 24, Oct 22, Nov 14)

A few pointers on selecting an article and writing a blog post.

• The minutiae and details are not critical. But you will have to be knowledgeable of the details in order to write a good summary.
• You should browse several articles on your topic to get a sense of what’s going on.
• Be smart in searching for articles. Don’t get caught up in the “reliability” of a source, but consider its quality, perspective, and bias.
• Setting your web browser homepage to the New York Times helps.
• Is there a connection between our class and what you’re reading?
• Are there particular statements, quotes, or descriptions in an article that strike you?
• In stating your opinion, push beyond superficial statements.  If you like an article or are irritated by an event, law, or incident, tell us why.
• Your paper should interpret the content of what you read, rather than restate it.

For the record, I encourage you to seek sources of information that would normally be described as “biased” or “slanted.”  There are an abundant number of news sites, both left and right.  Democracy Now!, Fox News, Heritage Foundation, The Socialist Worker, and The Nation all have good editorials by thoughtful people.  

The Fine Print:

• 3 blog posts, each worth 7%, for a total of 21% of your course grade.
• Each blog post should be roughly 250 words.  That’s a really long paragraph or one short page.
• The article must be recent (the last three months).
• The blog post must be live no later than noon on the assigned day.
• Late posts (12:01pm) will suffer a half –grade penalty for every day they are late.

  
  

  Sources I'm enjoying these days:

  
  

  http://truth-out.org - has some great coverage of the Syrian war, from a unique perspective.