Butler Cain

The Slow Death of Responsibility

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 19:07:00 +0000

"Nope."

That's how Rupert Murdoch, chairman of the News Corp. global media empire, answered when a member of the British Parliament asked him whether he was ultimately responsible for the phone hacking scandal that is engulfing his company and tarnishing British journalism.

It's the week's best example of how responsibility is dying a slow death.

So who is responsible for all of this? "The people I trusted to run it and maybe the people they trusted." But not him, of course. As chairman, he apparently is willing to reap the benefits of his position but ignore some of the troublesome responsibilities that come with it. An organization's leader is the one who sets the example and the tone for others to follow. Murdoch does that for News Corp. It's patently ridiculous to believe that certain practices and attitudes that go against the desires of the person in charge would be allowed to continue over a period of decades.

I learned one of the greatest leadership responsibility lessons of my life when I was in the fifth grade. I learned it from my baseball coach. This man was a royal, Grade A jerk. A tyrant, really. If you couldn't do something properly, it was your fault. You'd get yelled at and have to run laps around the ball field. He would gesticulate with "how did this loser get on my team?" motions when you didn't swing at a pitch down the middle or the ball went under your glove. It was a bad season.

But the lesson actually didn't "click" until several years later when I was in high school. I don't know why I was thinking of that jerk, but it dawned on me one day that he didn't take any responsibility for anything. He was the "coach," but he didn't teach me how to play the game. He didn't give me tips. He didn't spend any time with me. He didn't invest himself in my success. All he was interested in was trying to get the fifth and sixth graders who sucked the least out on the field. That's not responsibility. At best, that's simply showing up. At worst, it's negligence.

Perhaps that's why I nurture a slow burn of abhorrence for "leaders" who shackle their subordinates with the blame for failure -- those who are two or three or five or seven pay grades below the chief. That's so, so easy to do. It requires no fortitude, no vision, no guidance, no effort, no ... responsibility.

Responsibility in leadership is so, so important. It's about holding yourself accountable and encouraging others to hold you accountable, too. It's about service to your colleagues. Take responsibility for investing in their success and you are a lock to become a success yourself. It's automatic, almost. It's about acknowledging mistakes -- particularly your own role in making or allowing them -- and then accepting them as lessons for improvement. And, at times, it's about giving up your position when it's in everyone's best interest to do so.

The truth is, I really don't think responsibility is dying a slow death. I believe that there are many, many more non-Murdochs than Murdochs in this world.

It's just a bit disheartening to see such a bad example given a global platform.

Considering Attitudes About Teachers

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 02:14:00 +0000

I found out earlier today, rather accidentally, that the Texas A&M University System has cancelled its Teaching Excellence Awards program.

In short, the practice was that A&M system students were surveyed about their classes and teachers. They were asked if they thought their teachers deserved some extra recognition for the work they put into their classes. The recognition came with a cash reward, too.

Full disclosure -- I've been fortunate enough to get it. It's humbling, really, and I owe it to my students, but this isn't the point of today's blog post.

I learned of the program's demise through The Texas Tribune's article titled "A&M System Nixes Controversial Teaching Awards Program." I'm not getting into the "controversy" here. You can do that research yourself, if you like.

What struck me was a pair of comments from one particular reader. This person was glad to see the program go, and I'll excerpt a couple of those comments here.

"As if a small bonus makes teachers teach better. They're already earning a salary. They should be doing their job without some superficial carrot on a stick."

"There isn't enough extra money lying around to use as a carrot for great teaching. Professors and adjuncts already get their basic salary to begin with. Why race to the top for a small reward when you already have the reward of a salary and tenure?"

Let me say that I loathe when people take one very specific example and treat it as the representative sample. That's not what I'm doing here. But I must say that this kind of attitude struck me as familiar, and it reflects a sense that I've seen and read over and over about a fundamental misunderstanding of -- or, worse, outright disdain for -- what educators do.

These comments reminded me of how our society has been reacting as of late to news of executive bonuses during horrific economic conditions. I get that kind of righteous anger. However, I don't see this person making the same comments if the situation involved, say, her unionized steelworker father who gets an extra Christmas bonus for the good work he put in for the year.

Her logic is, of course, that her father wouldn't deserve the bonus because he's already got a job and he should just be happy with that. Besides, the economy is bad and there isn't enough money to be giving bonuses to steelworkers. Steelworkers aren't motivated by the chance to earn a little extra money at the end of the year anyway, right?

I just can't see this person making this argument. In fact, I'll just say straight up that it wouldn't happen.

I do admit, though, that there's a kernel of truth in this. I'm going to teach my classes as best as I can, whether there's an official "awards program" or not. Most other teachers will, too. The recognition and cash are just really nice "attaboys" -- a little bit of validation for the long hours we put in (both in and out of the classroom).

I made a choice to become an educator because I believe in it. Lord knows it isn't for the money or to try to score some kind of easy paycheck. The same is true for my friends and family members who are teachers or preparing to become teachers.

The issues here are bigger than a little bit of bonus money, true. But devaluing our work is a step toward devaluing education itself.

Summer Break?!?

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 06:22:00 +0000

My Summer I course is finito -- the aforementioned graduate historical research methods. My students seemed to have had a good time with it, they turned in some solid work, and I really enjoyed myself, too. Now for the continuation of my summer "break."

The summer break is a lie, by the way. Because work in the social sciences absolutely must have some kind of quantitative structure to be considered legitimate (can I get an "Amen," qualitative types?), I can show this mathematically. I've devised the following formula:

Required Research + Mandatory Institutional Review Board Training + Summer Classes + Fall Course Prepping + New Syllabus Construction + Conference Travel + The Occasional Meeting + Work I Pushed to the Summer + Oh, Crap I Forgot About That = Summer Break

Please also note the following corresponding condition:

Summer Break ≠ Getting Paid to Do Nothing for Three Months

The Evolution of a Name

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sat, 18 Jun 2011 01:03:00 +0000

Yikes! I have seriously neglected this blog during the past four weeks. No excuses. Let's resume, shall we?

Officially, I'm no longer a "Rookie Journalism Prof," so I guess I need to tweak that title -- unless you consider that I'm teaching my first master's class during the Summer 1 term. Four students were brave enough to sign up for my Media History Research Methods class.

Was that a collective "blech" I just heard? Yeah, I know. History, particularly a historical research methods class, doesn't seem like it's on the top of most students' list of "classes I must experience." One of my students actually campaigned for folks to sign up for the class, and the general reaction from some of her fellow students was "no thanks."

Even though I love historical research, and media history in particular, I understand that reaction. The word "history" seems to be synonymous with "dry" or "boring" or "arid" or "dull" or "stale" (you get it). Unfortunately, students sometimes have the idea that history is only about names and dates, and they don't see the connections between the past and present. Not fun. I don't teach it that way, but folks have to overcome these notions and get into my class to discover that.

I asked my grad students about it, and they might have found a solution. They suggested changing the class name from "Media History" to "Evolution of Media." That's quite modern-sounding, and there's no whiff of "stodgy" to be found.

I like it.

Reaping Some Rewards

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Wed, 11 May 2011 22:02:00 +0000

I am one amped professor right now.

This post essentially turns a 180 from my previous one (in which I was frustrated about failing to explain a literature review in an understandable way). Today, I'm feeling pretty darn good about my Feature Writing class. Earlier today, I got through grading all of their final story assignments. They. Were. Great!

Let me backtrack a little bit. Reading two dozen writing assignments isn't always a lot of fun. Sometimes, as an educator, you just have to slog through them. Writing comments can take up a ton of time, but I'm careful to write everything that I think of on those papers. And I do it for everybody. For my first batch of papers earlier in the semester, it took me nine hours to get through all of them. I also developed some serious hand cramps while doing it.

But it's worth it.

My philosophy about this is twofold: 1) I asked my students to spend time on this assignment, so I should respect them enough to actually read and consider what they've turned in to me; 2) if I'm not honest with them, don't tell them exactly what I'm looking for in future assignments, and don't challenge them, then what good am I as an educator? (As you've probably surmised, my answer to that question is "no good."

Obviously, all of this work -- theirs and mine -- paid off. Those who entered the semester with strong writing skills tackled some very serious topics in their final feature reports. I read stories about people who are fighting cancer, the pros and cons of professors and students "friending" each other on Facebook, and someone trying to make it as a professional wrestler while supporting his family. Those whose writing skills needed a little bit of work responded to my challenge by producing an impressive number of "A" papers.

I'm proud of them. It's as simple as that.

The Frustration of Failing to Get Through

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 05:24:00 +0000

Whew! I've been crazy busy for the past four weeks, so I've been lazy with my blogging. But the topic of this particular post has been chewing on me for the last couple of weeks.

I'm teaching a Media History course this semester, and one of the major assignments is to write a research paper of 10-to-12 pages. I've designed the course so that students have been turning in parts of it each week -- a list of primary sources, a statement of the topic's significance, the opening paragraph, etc. -- just to make sure they're staying on task.

One of those parts is the literature review, and this has proven to be the source of my frustration. I talked about the lit review early on in the semester and explained that it's just what it says it is -- it's a review of the literature that has already been written on a particular topic. I talked about looking at history books and journal articles (primarily) and then including those writers' perspectives before moving on to the main body of the paper. I also provided an example of a full lit review from my doctoral dissertation.

As it got closer to the time the lit review was due, a few students approached me and asked me to explain it again. And I did. Then I heard through the grapevine that others weren't sure how to do it. So I took some more class time to explain it again, and this time I gave them another example of a short lit review I had done for a doctoral history class assignment.

Obviously, just about no one in my class has ever been asked to write one. And by now, I was getting frustrated -- but not with my students. I'm frustrated at my apparent inability to adequately explain to them what a literature review is. I'm having great difficulty moving beyond this explanation: "Find what other historians have said about your topic, and include a few sentences about the major points of their perspectives. If there's some disagreement among historians about this topic, be sure to include that, too. Just include a brief review of the literature that's already out there."

The kicker came Sunday night, when I checked my course e-mail and found two messages from one of my students who happens to be traveling for a university competition. In the first one, she told me she wasn't sure she was doing the lit review correctly and asked for some feedback. The second one was a follow up saying that she had spoken to a librarian at the school she was visiting, and the librarian had explained it to her thoroughly. My student also told me that she had been doing the lit review the wrong way before the librarian corrected her.

In the reply, I asked my student to share what the librarian told her because I'm highly interested in hearing it. I hope it'll help me lick this problem the next time I teach this class.

In the meantime, I'm glad someone was able to help her get a good grip on this topic. But I'm further frustrated that I wasn't able to do it myself.

Using Shortened Links in Research Papers

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 03:55:00 +0000

I'm working furiously on a research paper that has a submission deadline of April 1st. I'm hoping all of my work will pay off with an invitation to present my findings at a major research conference scheduled for later in the fall. That, of course, will help with my road to tenure.

That's not what I'm wondering about, though. While referencing a news report that I'm using in my paper, I copied the web link so I could put it in a footnote. Then I stared at it for a couple of moments. It's long. And ugly. You know the kind I'm talking about. Something like this:

http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?DBId=5197&LASTSRCHMODE=1&RQT=575
(This is actually from my dissertation bibliography.)

As I was staring at that long link, I wondered about using a shortened one. That would save space and it wouldn't be as ugly on the page. Besides, if reviewers are reading a printed version of your paper, and they want to check your source, you don't want to make them type in a 50+ character web address.

I've been using http://bit.ly/ to shorten links for my tweets, so I decided to investigate it a bit. My greatest concern is about permanency. I don't want to create a shortened link for something and then have it go away in a couple of years. bit.ly says I don't have to worry about that. Their links are designed to be permanent. Well, what if bit.ly goes away eventually? What happens then? They have an answer for that, too.

Okay. I'm satisfied with these explanations. So I took that humongous link and chopped it down to a nice compact size for my footnote. I did do one other thing, though. The bit.ly address doesn't show the root website. So in addition to the bit.ly-generated link address to the article, I included the news organization's main website, as well. That way, if a reviewer wanted to check the site for other things, he or she can do it.

Now I'm curious if anyone else has used a link shortener for academic references -- or if you've been told not to. If you have some experience with this, or a comment, I'd like to hear from you.

Twitter Revelation Redux

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sat, 05 Mar 2011 16:41:00 +0000

I mentioned in my last blog post that I had an epiphany earlier this week regarding Twitter. I hadn't put much active thought into it, but I realized that I've been assuming communication majors in my classes (and others) were hip to the Twitter thing. I was apparently assuming some inherent knowledge on their part about how it works and how incredibly significant Twitter has become in the ever-expanding field of communication.

I was wrong.

This is not a student problem, by the way. It's a professor problem. (I'm pointing to myself, here.) I needed to start doing a better job of incorporating Twitter -- and other types of social media -- into my normal lessons. And I'm not the only one. One of my students (in a different class) told me that her professor had just begun doing the same thing.

So, I built a huge chunk of our recent class time around playing with Twitter. Just a few minutes before class, I recruited my friend and long-time public radio colleague Brett Tannehill to correspond with us. I pulled up my account @ButlerCain and we got to work.

We talked about hash tags, how they operate and even created one for our class. We learned how the "@" symbol functions in Twitter. We talked about "trends," "replies" and "retweets." We learned how to shorten links so we can share web content we find interesting or entertaining.

By the time we got moving along, a few in the class had already logged on (it's a "smart" classroom with computers) and had joined the discussion. Another created a Twitter account right there on the spot and dove in, too. With Brett corresponding on the other end, it was a dynamic and fun lesson.

The most important message I wanted my students to understand, though, was this -- even if you don't care to use Twitter for yourself, your potential internship directors and employers will ask you if you know how to use it. If you aren't familiar with it, your chances of landing that position start dropping.

Based on feedback from some of my students, they appreciated the lesson. And that's the whole point of my job.

A Twitter Revelation

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 03:48:00 +0000

"Holy cow, I've got to revamp some of this course."

I don't know how often faculty members have such a revelation while in the middle of class, but I had one of those moments today. Specifically, it involves Twitter.

I teach one section of an intro media writing class, but all sections use the same textbook (I selected it). This is the second semester I've used it and, on the whole, it works just fine. It does have some gaps (like no chapter on editorial writing), so I build my own lessons to get those topics covered.

As I was tweaking the current lesson, I realized that the "Writing for the Web" chapter contained nothing about Twitter (not to mention a few other social media sites). Knowing how important Twitter has been to news reporting for the past couple of years, I made sure to introduce it (and some other social media sites) to my class. I also decided that any conversation about Twitter would need to include link shorteners, so I used bit.ly as my example.

I was surprised when only about four of my 20+ students said they use Twitter. I was even more surprised when some students said they had never even heard of it and didn't know how it worked. Refer to the "Holy Cow" comment above.

I did a little academic tap dance and switched my classwork assignment. It was pretty simple on the surface: find a news article online somewhere and "tweet" about it in 140 characters or less. (This was done in a word processor, not through Twitter.) For the second tweet, write some different copy and include a shortened link to the article.

I kept feeling the need to justify what we were doing. "If you're going to be in communication, your internship directors or future employers will expect you to know how to do this," I would say. A few students had some initial trouble with the Twitter concept ("why would anybody want to do this?"), but they got a grip on the method pretty quickly.

It got me to thinking that I had better make sure my students know how to use Twitter as a media tool. I'm seriously considering incorporating it into many of our remaining assignments for the semester.

Public Media Journalists Should Speak Against Funding Cuts

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 02:45:00 +0000

This is a sticky topic, and I hope I don't raise the ire of too many of my colleagues on this one.

I saw a question posed recently about whether public radio journalists should be actively involved in the public broadcasting defunding debate, particularly with any activity that would involve publicly expressing displeasure about the funding cut proposal (this would include contacting congressional representatives).

Feedback has been minimal, but the consensus was that journalists should stay out of it to avoid any perceived conflicts.

I very, very respectfully disagree.

Full disclosure: I spent more than a decade as a public radio news director, and I'm now a full-time university faculty member. I will always consider myself to be a journalist, and I will always place a special significance on the importance of public broadcasting. So please allow me to say "we" when discussing this issue.

We must speak out. Taking a stand against these cuts is taking a stand for our own livelihood. It's taking a stand for the millions who rely on public broadcasting. You can be a rock-solid journalist, fair and impartial, and still fight for your professional life. There's nothing at all wrong with this, and our listeners will understand. In fact, I think they should expect it.

One of the traditional tenets of journalism is to be a check on power and elitism. How can we seriously expect to have any credibility when we say that we'll stand with the weak if we're not willing to stand for ourselves? This federal funding cut proposal is wrong, misguided, vindictive. It targets a very specific group (that would be us) and it breaks a promise the country made to itself more than 40 years ago when it created the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to both support public broadcasting in America and to shield it against political opportunism.

I don't think this is an issue about impartiality. A journalist is not an automaton and cannot be expected to live that way. Even now, we have highly respected journalism organizations -- and journalists! -- who are speaking out against the violence our colleagues have encountered during the recent unrest in north Africa and the Middle East. I feel that it's our duty to speak out against these threats with a united voice. Is it impartial? No. Is it important? Yes.

Now, public broadcasting and its unique style of journalism is facing a real threat in the United States. Shouldn't we speak out about this, as well?

I say yes, we should.

Defunding Public Broadcasting is a Ludicrous Idea

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 04:52:00 +0000

The argument that public broadcasting should not be publicly supported and should adopt a commercial-style funding model is straight up stupid.

Let's start with America's public television system. It's too fragmented to survive this idea. Programming decisions don't come from a centralized location; each station is essentially its own island. That allows programmers to schedule a variety of shows that will better serve their local audiences.

There are some inherent problems with this set up (such as the lack of national consistency in programming), and those would only be exacerbated by a commercialized funding scheme. Perhaps New York, L.A. and D.C. (and some other major metro areas) would have enough concentrated wealth within the viewing area to allow the station to go without federal dollars. That's obviously not true for America's smaller markets, where many public television stations have a hard enough time staying afloat as it is.

Let's move to public radio. Local stations also get to make their own programming decisions, but public radio is helped by the fact that NPR provides a consistent stream of national programming that serves as a unifying agent. My local station is facing a double whammy, and it's already making listeners aware of this situation. High Plains Public Radio is staring at the proposed federal funding cut in addition to the proposed elimination of all state support for public broadcasting in Kansas (where HPPR's main offices are located.)

That's 35% of its budget. Imagine taking a 35% salary cut. What kind of choices would you have to make?

One argument that proponents of budget cuts put forth is that the commercial market already provides similar types of programming. That one can be debunked pretty quickly. Show me where programs like Morning Edition, This American Life, and A Prairie Home Companion are being produced. Show me another Newshour.

You can't. Not even on satellite radio.

And I haven't even mentioned the high-quality, eclectic and localized music shows that are a hallmark of public radio. You won't find that on broadcast radio anywhere else because -- let's face it -- some of it isn't commercially viable. ("Commercially viable" is a suspect term anyway because there's a whole lot of worthless crap on commercial radio.)

And that gets to the core of this whole debate: the insinuation that if something isn't commercially viable, then it doesn't deserve public support. I'll quote from an episode of M*A*S*H here -- "Bull cookies!"

The commercial marketplace has proven over and over again that it's not always the best arbiter of quality. Besides, America's media system, which is based on the idea of capitalism, is in the minority as far as global media systems go. Many of these systems, especially in Europe, have healthy support from the public treasury.

It would be just as ludicrous sounding if we told our politicians to decline their publicly-funded salaries because they made a choice to leave private sector employment. They willingly rejected the capitalist system in favor of a job that depended on the public's dole. But the government does -- and should -- support our elected officials because they're performing a public service.

So is public broadcasting.

Why Do We Journalists Sound Jubilant?

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sat, 12 Feb 2011 04:55:00 +0000

I've been reading, watching, and listening to a lot of the coverage coming out of Egypt during the past couple of weeks. On the whole, I think it has been outstanding.

As I was viewing and listening today to the reports that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak had resigned the presidency, I noticed something. Reporters covering the crowds in Tahrir Square in Cairo spoke in a tone of voice that, until today, I hadn't heard before. The tone they used could best be described as jubilant.

Let me say this: I'm not trying to paint with too broad a brush. I won't claim that every reporter was doing this. But, it happened enough for me to notice it. So I started to wonder why this might be happening.

Is it possible that journalists, whose colleagues (perhaps even themselves) were being hunted and harassed, assaulted and arrested just days ago, are celebrating the comeuppance of a thuggish regime?

Could it be the inevitable release that this part of the saga is finally over and journalists can return to their respective homes?

Could these correspondents simply be getting caught up in the jubilant mood of the crowd?

I'm also hearing gratitude from interviewees who are thanking media outlets for their important coverage. Is there a chance that we, the news media, see this as our victory, too?

I'm not sure any of these questions can be answered adequately. But I still think they should be asked.

Snow Day = Uninterrupted Production

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 03:59:00 +0000

The Texas panhandle has been lashed by some wintry-type weather during the last couple of weeks. We hit some record lows (in the -5 degree range) with -20 to -30 wind chills. We've had plenty of snow, too.

However, the weather was never bad enough for the university to consider shutting down -- until this past Wednesday. Parts of our area had white-out conditions Tuesday night, it was bitterly cold, and the snow quickly turned into dangerous ice by Wednesday morning. Travel was going to be treacherous, and around 5:30 that morning, word came that the university had closed.

Faced with the prospect of not having to go to the office that day, I ate some breakfast and then almost immediately got to work (in my recliner, admittedly). I got ahead on some classroom reading. I organized some digital files. I started collecting data on a research paper that I'd been meaning to begin for the past week.

It's amazing how much work you can accomplish when you don't actually have to go to work.

And I'm not the only one who thinks this way. I saw people's Facebook status updates throughout the day detailing how many papers they got graded or how much reading they were able to do. Some of these people are fellow professors; others are students.

Those who know me, though, won't be surprised to read that I did get to the office later that evening for a live training webinar on social media. It was totally worth it.

As an added bonus, I discovered that plowing willy-nilly through an almost-empty parking lot full of several inches of snow is quite fun. We southerners don't get that kind of opportunity very often, you know.

Now the Real Education Begins

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 00:04:00 +0000

That's essentially what my doctoral program chair said about earning a PhD. Sure, you've achieved a certain level of academic status. But, it's really just the metaphorical starting point. You get the real education over a lifetime of study and effort.

I just finished reading an article in Quill, the Society of Professional Journalists' magazine. Titled "Landing the Education Gig," it doesn't have anything to do with a PhD.

It does have a lot to do with getting an education, though.

According to this article, those of us who have spent years as professional journalists cannot expect to let our experience speak for itself anymore when trying to make the switch into full-time (or even part-time) teaching. Journalism has changed so radically during the past few years that, to a certain degree, much of what many older professionals know has become dated.

Colleges and universities are still looking for pros who can bring an understanding of professional ethics and solid writing techniques with them. But these schools also are increasingly looking for people who can teach search-engine optimization (SEO) techniques, web design, multi-platform distribution, and using social media tools such as Blogger, Facebook and Twitter.

For many of us (myself included), these are things that require extra education. And if we don't make the effort to get up to speed, we're dooming ourselves (and our students, I might add).

I'm not in a bad spot with some of this stuff, thankfully. I learned a whole lot of new things last semester simply by teaching the New Media class. I had to prep like mad, of course, and deciding to go without a textbook provided a little extra push. I'm comfortable with social media. But I have significant weaknesses in some areas that I really need to address.

One of the first places I'm going to go to for help is Poynter's News University. It has been a few years since I last used one of their online training courses, but I think the time is right to dive back in. I take this personally. I want my students to be competitive when they enter the job market, and I want to know that I've done all that I can to prepare them.

An important part of being an educator, I believe, is remembering to educate yourself.

I am the Future

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 02:20:00 +0000

Please hold off on the "wow, he's conceited" comments. Let me explain.

WT's Department of Communication puts on "Communication Week" every spring. It's a five-day event that showcases what we do. One of the events is a fashion show in which teams of students are responsible for dressing a faculty "model." I was recruited because of my modeling and fashion background (if you don't know me, I need to explain that the previous statement is a lie).

Our theme this year is "Looking Forward, Looking Back" and my fellow models will be donning clothing from various decades. During a recent meeting, I noted that there was no one who would be wearing an outfit from the future. That, of course, meant that I volunteered to be future boy. I'm the only guy competing against my lovely female colleagues, so I'm hoping to get a few pity votes.

The clothing is completely controlled by the students, so I'm placing my faith in them. If there are any photos (and I'm certain that there will be), I'll try to post one on Facebook. It'll happen in mid-February.

Prep Prep Hooray!

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sat, 15 Jan 2011 22:51:00 +0000

After stalking me for weeks, the spring semester has finally caught up. I've spent a while ignoring it. I was able to get out of town for about four weeks and see some family and friends back in Alabama I haven't seen in months and, in some cases, years.

And, like a good rookie prof, I brought some of my class materials with me so that I could spend some time prepping during the holidays. Any of you veteran profs want to take a guess as to how much I actually accomplished?

Right. But, I did complete and post my syllabi. I even added an exam to one of my classes (much to the faux chagrin of some of my students who follow me on Facebook).

Now I'm back in work mode. I spent Friday sorting through a month's worth of mail, answering e-mails, and scheduling important dates during a faculty meeting (in addition to signing up for summer and fall classes). Now I'm spending my weekend doing more classroom prep. My three classes for this semester are Media Writing (which I taught last semester), Feature Writing and Media History.

I've tweaked Media Writing a bit, incorporating some things I learned while teaching it last semester. I'm still building the history and feature writing classes because I haven't taught them yet. I'm spending today working on Media History. I'm familiar with both the textbook and a methods book I'm using, but I'm having to reread them in their entirety because they are new editions. And, I'm going to experiment with my teaching method for this class.

I'm thinking of doing a freestyle, no PowerPoint slides kind of thing. I want to foster discussion and thinking, not lectures and note taking. I've noticed that no matter what I'm talking about, as soon as a new slide pops up on the screen, students drop their heads and start typing/writing everything that's on the screen. I find that to be kind of a drag on the class. So, I'm hoping that they'll instead focus on our conversations and respond to my cues, such as "Hey, I want you to remember this."

Am I being naive? Perhaps walking into a rookie prof pitfall?

P.S. When I talk of prepping for classes, I can't help but think of my colleagues at Chung Dahm Learning in Seoul. It seemed like we were ALWAYS prepping for our classes. That's one of the reasons why they're among the best teachers in South Korea!

The Making of a Professor

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 19:43:00 +0000

I've spent a lot of time lately thinking about what I need to do to be a great professor. I'm not suggesting that I am one. I'm not even close. I hope to be, one day, but it's going to take effort, lots of mistakes, and constant vigilance against complacency.

One thing I'm convinced of, though, is that one of the things that defines a solid professor is his or her relationship with students. (The relationship among colleagues is important, too, but that's for another day.) While I was thinking about this idea, I realized that my philosophy has largely been shaped by three of my own professors who have had immeasurable influence on me academically, professionally, and personally. And even though my relationships with all three continue today, I can trace my thoughts on teaching back to my undergraduate experiences with them.

Pam Doyle Tran, who is now the assistant dean for Undergraduate Student Services at The University of Alabama's College of Communication and Information Sciences, was my first college professor to eschew the title of "Doctor."

"Just call me Pam," she would say. This was coming from a woman who worked AND raised a family while earning her graduate degrees. She struggled and sacrificed for her PhD, and here she was telling a bunch of 19- and 20-year-olds that we could skip the honorific. I remember sitting in her class and being immediately struck by the humbleness of her attitude.

She displayed this attitude every day by getting in the metaphorical media trenches with us, teaching us how to do our jobs professionally and respectfully. She allowed us to see her as "one of us," so much so that I might very well have been her first student ever to buy her a beer. I echo her every time I meet my classes at the start of a semester.

"Just call me Butler," I say.

Frank Deaver has long since retired from Alabama's journalism program. I guess that I was among the last few groups of undergrads to come through his classes. He, too, is a PhD, and he has traveled the world as a journalism teacher and trainer. Frank was tough. My first report came back with a "C" on it. Ouch. That kicked my butt into high gear. I vowed to myself that very day that if I could make an "A" in Frank's reporting class, I wouldn't care about any other grade I made for the rest of my college career (as long as I was passing, of course).

Frank had expectations of us -- high ones. We had a major project in which we planned a trip to our state capital. Each student contacted two weekly newspapers and promised them two stories each on some major political issues that were affecting their areas. We then drove to Montgomery, spent all day chasing legislators, spent the night, worked a little more the next day, drove back to Tuscaloosa, and then spent the next night banging out all of our stories for a next morning deadline.

I still needed another viewpoint for one of my reports, and it was very early in the morning. Nearing the deadline, I found a phone, called a potential source out of the blue, and -- bless her -- she agreed to be interviewed. I did some quick typing and editing, placed her quotations toward the rear of the report, and handed it to Frank with just a little time to spare.

"I don't see another viewpoint," he said while reading through my work. "It's coming," I said.

I made an "A" in that class. I remember working so hard because Frank expected it of me. If your professor doesn't set high demands for you, then who will? He taught me to expect a lot of my students -- and to be clear about those expectations -- because to do otherwise is a disservice to them.

David Sloan, another PhD who is retiring from Alabama's journalism program after this academic year, was not only an undergraduate instructor of mine. As I matured academically, he also was my Masters and PhD programs adviser. He is one of our country's preeminent media history scholars. But back to my earlier days. He delivered a profound lesson when he struck me dumb as I sat in his Introduction to Reporting class. He asked a very simple question.

"Who in here can quote the First Amendment?"

Here I was, a student of journalism, a young man willing to be a champion of press freedom, and I did not know the First Amendment. I'm not so sure that I had even bothered to do anything more than glance at it. I was embarrassed. Mortified. A phony.

I committed it to memory. That's the first step toward having a better understanding of it, and David cared enough to let me know that this was something important. I have preached his lesson at every opportunity. In front of groups of writers. At training seminars. And, in every class that I teach. It's a requirement. Knowing the First Amendment is also a prerequisite for working at The Prairie, the student newspaper that I advise. I teach students every day who are going to become professional communicators of some type. If I don't give them the push to know and understand the fundamental law that governs the freedom to express ourselves, then I've failed as a journalism professor.

David, Frank, and Pam led me by example. They pushed me to meet their standards. They challenged me to be more than mediocre. Their lessons continue to guide and influence me. All three of them are members of that most special rank of professor: mentors who also became friends. That just might be the greatest lesson a professor could ever teach.

Couldn't Overcome This Challenge

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 22:48:00 +0000

Well, dang it.

The Prairie missed its final issue of the semester this week. We couldn't put it together because WT's Fine Arts Complex got suplexed by some ornery equipment.

The Internet, network drives and some computer systems went down over the weekend. We produce The Prairie with that stuff, so we were out of luck. On Monday, service was restored ever so briefly, and we were hopeful we could get the paper out by our regular Tuesday morning deadline. Nope. Service went back down, and the servers that we need may not be able to be accessed for another several days.

Check out my awesome quotation in the Amarillo Globe-News.

This happened at a terrible time because it's the last week of classes. Final projects of all kinds -- print, video, audio -- are sitting in a virtual holding pattern (if they didn't get deleted, that is). Students from across the communication disciplines can't get to them. Some of my faculty colleagues on the first floor still don't have electricity in their offices.

After some student freak outs and subsequent reassurances from faculty, things are moving along as best they can. In fact, the last issue of The Prairie is now available online.

On a bright side, I'm treating my newspaper staff to an end-of-the-semester dinner in just a few minutes. I've asked a lot of them this semester, and they deserve some recognition.

What better gift for college journalists than free food?

Gettin' Lucky

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sat, 04 Dec 2010 05:48:00 +0000

Oh, stop it! I'm talking about grant-funded research.

Getting grants is a big deal in academia. Some of the best researchers can pull in hundreds of thousands of dollars for their work. I'm still sitting in the grant funding sandbox, but I've had a couple of small successes recently that I'm quite excited about.

I started with a grant request to attend a Poynter Institute seminar sometime next summer. Poynter is the recognized leader in journalism training, and I've always wanted to attend one of their week-long seminars. As a journalism faculty member, it's really important to me that I stay up on the industry's professional practices. I don't want to become one of those corduroy-coat-with-elbow-patches-wearing, never-heard-of-Tweeter kind of professors. (Disclosure: I own corduroy coats. Plural.)

As usual, there were way more requests than could possibly be funded. But, I'm one of the lucky ones. The review committee here at WT liked my application enough to give me partial funding. It won't cover all of my travel costs, but the amount will essentially cover Poynter's tuition. Hey, St. Petersburg, Florida! I'm coming your way soon.

Earlier this week, I was notified that I received another grant to travel up to Worcester, Massachusetts, this summer to do some archival research at the American Antiquarian Society.

Now, don't be all "Freakin' geek! He wants to vacation at a LIBRARY! Dork." The books I'm wanting to examine -- the Senate and Assembly journals of the New York State Legislature from 1827-1829 -- are only available at the AAS. The Society has the only copies available in the world, and they don't loan them out. I'm planning to look at how lawmakers considered the issue of press freedom as it related to the legal concept of contempt by publication.

Party in the archives, y'all.

The 10-Book Challenge FINISHED: Book #10

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sun, 28 Nov 2010 04:14:00 +0000

Maus II, A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began by Art Spiegelman

I hadn't anticipated reading Spiegelman's other installment of Maus, but I was so impressed with the first one that I drove up to Amarillo today to purchase the second one.

This one begins when Spiegelman's father, Vladek, is brought to Auschwitz. The subtitle of this part of the story -- And Here My Troubles Began -- simply can't capture the horrors Vladek endured.

Despite that, the reader already knows that Vladek and his wife, Anja, who also was sent to Auschwitz, survive their experiences. You know eventually they will be reunited, so it's a resolution that the reader looks forward to.

Spiegelman uses narrative masterfully. And, it's an extra treat to see which animals he chooses to represent people of different nationalities.

I still have a couple of books in the works, but that'll do it for my official 10-Book Challenge! For those of you who peeked in on my efforts, thanks for your interest. I'm hoping to continue reading some good stuff through the holidays, and I hope you get to, as well.

The 10-Book Challenge: Book #9

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 05:13:00 +0000

Maus I, A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman

You can find Maus on various lists of must-read journalism. Spiegelman isn't a journalist -- he's an artist -- but he portrays his father's story of surviving the Nazi holocaust in the style of journalism narrative. And, he also does it in the form of a graphic novel. It won a Pulitzer Prize in 1992.

This was one of the original 10 books I had planned to read. It just happened to come right after I read Elie Wiesel's Night (see Book #8). Once I started reading it, I just couldn't stop. It's a very personal work, and Spiegelman doesn't candy coat his relationship with his father, Vladek. Vladek's relationship with his second wife, also a survivor, is strained, as well.

Spiegelman jumps back and forth between the past and the present, and it provides the author with an opportunity to both tell his father's story and also show how those experiences still influence his father.

This is one of the books my Feature Writing class will be reading next spring.

The 10-Book Challenge: Book #8

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 06:31:00 +0000

Night by Elie Wiesel

I was poking around in my departmental office recently and came across a boxful of this book. It had been the selection for the Readership WT program three years ago. I hadn't read this since high school, so I grabbed a copy (I'm faculty -- I can do that) and took it home.

This is one of the most widely read books on the planet, so you don't need a recap from me. But I'll tell you why I decided to put it on my current list.

This week saw another flare up between North and South Korea. It reminded me of a book I read while I was living in Seoul -- Aquariums of Pyongyang: Ten Years in the North Korean Gulag by Kang Chol-Hwan. Wiesel's and Kang's similar experiences in labor camps controlled by oppressive regimes struck me.

Wiesel's Night is a testament to the need to tell these kinds of stories, and we think of them as necessary so that we, as humans, "never forget." We're supposed to learn from these events, right? But around the same time Wiesel was accepting the Nobel Peace Prize in the mid 1980s -- some 40 years after his experiences -- Kang was himself barely surviving the meat grinder that North Korea continues to be.

It's frustrating. And that's one of many reasons why I highly recommend both of these books.

The 10-Book Challenge: Book #7

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 03:13:00 +0000

How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster

I picked up this book while I was still living in Seoul. I barely started reading it in the spring before I moved back to the U.S. -- and then life got in the way for a while. I've significantly ramped up my consumption of literature during the last couple of years, so I thought this book might teach me a few things about analyzing and interpreting it. It has delivered marvelously.

Foster uses humor while writing from the informed perspective of a longtime lit professor (University of Michigan at Flint). He examines all kinds of literary symbols and patterns -- quests, communion, the weather, geography, physical ailments, etc. -- and explains what they might mean once the reader starts digging beneath the surface of the story.

This really is a cool book, and I'd recommend it to anyone, particularly those of us non-lit teachers who would like to be able to decode the deeper meanings of what we're reading. What's even greater about Foster's attitude is that he readily admits -- and even encourages the point of view -- that there's no one way to interpret anything. We all see things based on our own knowledge, previous experiences, and attitudes.

Here's my favorite quote from the book: "Education is mostly about institutions and getting tickets stamped; learning is what we do for ourselves. When we're lucky, they go together. If I had to choose, I'd take learning." (p. 284)

* BONUS READING *

"The Fall of the House of Usher" by Edgar Allan Poe

Foster used this story a few times throughout his book to make a few of his points. I hadn't read it in probably two decades, and it's short enough to sneak in a quick read, so I revisited it. As is typical for Poe, the story is dark and creepy. If you haven't read it, maybe it'll take 30 minutes. Note: consider the possibilities about the relationship between the brother and sister.

Academic Discussion via Twitter

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 19:43:00 +0000

I've finally arrived at the point in the fall semester when I need to be casting significant glances ahead to the spring. That means working on syllabi for two new classes (Media History and Feature Writing) and making syllabus adjustments for a class I'll be teaching again (Media Writing).

Lately, though, I've been spending time trying to figure out how to incorporate social media into my classes. I'm playing with the idea of creating a Twitter account branded specifically for me as a WT professor (don't laugh at my photo). Or, I might just use the one I have and assign some specific hashtags to help me distinguish topics in one class from topics discussed in another. Or, I just might create one hashtag so that my students can follow and comment on the things that are being discussed in all of my classes. That might be a bit confusing, though. Decisions....

I think Twitter can be quite valuable for students, particularly those who study mass communication. It forces them to be succinct with their thoughts and economical with their language. Twitter, of course, allows for a maximum of 140 characters. This restriction is a great tool in an era where my colleagues and I are finding many students who have difficulty paring their expression to its basic, clear essence.

For years my public radio colleagues have used a method to get focused on what their reports are essentially about -- describe it in three words. If you can't, you're trying to cover too much. Once you get those three words, let them be your guide. If you stray from them, you're getting away from the point of your report. It helps discipline your thinking and your writing. I think Twitter might be able to do the same for focusing our academic discussions.

To express yourself succinctly, you must first think about what you're going to say. That's a valuable habit to cultivate (don't even get me started on our current pundit culture). And the idea here is not to limit academic discussion; instead, I'm hoping this will focus academic discussion, making it even more inviting and stimulating.

This sounds all nice and neat on a Sunday afternoon blog post, but I have no idea if this would actually work in a classroom setting. I would certainly have to sell it to my students, and I would have to make sure that this exercise is both relevant and stimulating for them (and me) for an entire semester.

I'd love to hear from anyone who has experience (success and failure) with a similar effort. And, if any of you readers have thoughts or advice to pass along, by all means, please do so.

Reading Books With (Not "On") a Smartphone

noreply@blogger.com (Butler Cain) — Sat, 13 Nov 2010 16:33:00 +0000

My colleagues were right -- my smartphone has changed my life.

In the "old days," once I crawled into bed at the end of the day, that was it. Now I watch a few moments of Al Jazeera on a live network feed before visiting slumber land. If I wake up at 2:37 AM, I no longer just roll over. I check The New York Times for breaking news or Facebook for updates from my friends in Asia. When I wake up, I don't even bother getting out of bed or finding my glasses. "Let's see what's on my phone this morning...."

So, too, has the smartphone made reading and research so much more efficient for me. I used to get irritated when I encountered words or concepts that weren't familiar to me. I want to understand what I'm reading -- while I'm reading it -- without feeling the need to return to it later once I've done some more research. My smartphone has solved that problem for me.

"I beg your pardon, Mr. Karl Marx, but I haven't had an occasion to use the word asceticism and have no idea what it means. No problem -- I have an iPhone. Aha!"

Then I write the definition or concept in the page margins.

And that brings me to my whole point for writing this post in the first place. I still enjoy reading physical copies of books, not digital ones. I like writing in my books. I like having a book in my hands. It's a much more personal relationship, I think. Books themselves have a story to tell about their existence, and they're a commodity with real value. They're traded among friends. Treasured as family heirlooms. Collected in used book stores (the Foreign Book Store, located in Itaewon in Seoul, South Korea, became one of my favorite places).

There's something comfortable about books, and that's why I'll continue to read them the old fashioned way. And my smartphone will be right there with me, ready to assist.