New Media Shift is for students like myself who want to learn more about new media, multimedia and social media – but have found that there aren’t many people who can teach it to them.
My name is Erica Shekell and I’ve been told that I’m going into a dying field.
But I don’t believe it.
I’m a second-year journalism student at Michigan State University. Like many universities, Michigan State University recently approved a massive revamp of its journalism curriculum (March 2010). The changes are meant to reflect the rapidly changing nature of journalism with a greater focus on online journalism and other new media. The new curriculum debuted in Fall 2010.
I’m ecstatic about these changes – but I wish they had come sooner. I’m almost halfway through my journalism education. Had I been two years older, I would have missed these changes completely – and I would have been the last of the old generation of journalists, expected to know more because I am young, but just as lost as the older journalists still clinging to their glory days with their 35 years of service at a daily newspaper.
And had I been two years younger, I would have been completely immersed in the new media.
Many young students like myself are finding that they are riding the edge between old and new media. Professors tell us, “It’s all going online. You need to know how to do video. You need to know how to take photos and do design and maintain a blog and have a Twitter account.” And we say, “We’re ready. Show us.” But then there’s no answer.
We’re frustrated when we find that there are only a handful of professors who can teach us these things, and even fewer classes devoted to these things we’re supposed to know. The curriculums are catching up fast; but in the few years it takes for such changes to take root, we will have already graduated. Given the circumstances, it is up to us to absorb as much information about the future as we can.
That’s what my blog is all about. New Media Shift is for students like myself who want to learn more about new media, multimedia and social media – but have found that there aren’t many people who can teach it to them.
My blog is a great place to start because I’m just as much in the learning process as everyone else. At New Media Shift, I plan to blog about Twitter, video-editing, search engine optimization, journalism ethics, flash drives and Flip video camcorders, typography and web page design, and the classes I find at MSU that will actually teach you a thing or two about new media.
But I don’t want to be left standing high up on my soap box – I want to find others who are learning just like I am, and I want to learn things from them as well. So write a comment on my blog, follow me on Twitter, send me a useful video link, tell me about an awesome website you found, or just send me a message to say hello!
You see this in other fields also, educational facilities fail to cope with the fast technological advancements. Just means that the workload tips heavier on the students in the future.