1. The challenges of training student
journalists in an era of new media
convergence
Dr. Carolina Matos
Government Department, University of Essex

2. Key points
• “Old” versus “new” media
• What is meant by “media convergence”?
• Changes in the nature of media industries and in the
journalism profession
• Challenges faced by senior journalists and professors
alike (resistance versus hype)
• New media and democracy
• Role of journalists in the new media convergence era
• Growth in new media courses, research and the
integration of the journalism curriculum

3. “Old” versus “new” media
• Old versus new media – modern versus postmodern
• Information overload, multiple sources of
information, no longer one “single” truth (old media)
• “Passive” versus “active” audience: interactivity and
participatory journalism
• Crisis of the “objectivity” regime in the mainstream
media, pressures on the journalism profession
• Growth of multiple journalism narratives co-existing
– i.e. citizen journalism; community journalism;
public journalism; participatory journalism, etc.
• Cooperation and competition: old and new media
co-exist

4. New era of media convergence
• Communication pressure = Volume X Speed
of circulation X Density
• “Within this growing flow of information, the
part played by journalistic products will
decrease proportionately, the assumption
being that the ‘communication pressure’ it
creates reduces both journalism’s scope and
the citizen’s accessibility.” (Bardoel, 1996,
380)

5. Challenges for journalists and professors
• How is new media affecting the journalism profession?
• As technologies became more complex from the 1980’s, the
task of investigating and producing news demands an
increase in not only the skills required of a reporter, but in the
speed of publication in the frenetic pace of writing
instantaneously for a 24 hours news cycle
• Limits of interactivity and of the “active audience”
• Limits of digital democracy and networked politics
• As Tarcia and Marinho (2008) state, media entrepreneurs
represented in the World Association of Newspapers (WAN)
evaluated the phenomena of multimedia newsrooms and
highlighted: this is about cost reduction, productivity and
expansion of markets.

6. The future role for journalists
• Critics have argued that media companies of the
future will require fewer staff, especially in a
moment of decline of circulations, decrease of
advertising alongside the need to pursue further
investments in new technologies in order to continue
to be competitive.
• Bardoel (1996) says, in this densely packed space
with information overload, journalists will (and
should) take the lead in directing and defining
debate.
• “Journalism will not, as in the era of the mass media,
control public debate, but it will take the lead in
directing and defining it” (Bardoel, 1996; 387 in
Matos, 2008).

7. Challenges for journalists and professors
• Bhuiyan has listed some of the main challenges that
professors face when it comes to teaching about media
convergence:
• 1) Lack of institutional commitment, skills and resources – this
refers to the financial constraints of faculty when attempting
to upgrade the multimedia teaching laboratories, and
funding;
• 2) Fear and resistance to change – the fears that is often
shared by students and veteran professors regarding studying
and practice of cross-platform journalism, and the anxiety
that new technologies will dilute good reporting;
• 3) Changing curricula to reflect the industry demand – the
innovative ways of implementing a multimedia curriculum.

8. Challenges of this current reality
• Salaverria (2011, 138) in Online Journalism meets the
university: ideas for teaching and research has affirmed that
this new reality “calls for a kind of research and training of its
own
• “…this new variant has compelled teachers to explore new
linguistic possibilities, to keep track of continuously evolving
technologies, to identify professional profiles and renewed
editorial processes….”.
• Problems with terminology: is it “online journalism”; “digital
journalism”; electronic journalism”; multimedia journalism”;
“web-journalism” or “cyber-journalism”?

9. What is media convergence?
• A buzzword, overused (i.e. like
globalization)
• Resistance of senior staff/ teachers
• Journalism on the Internet has been “looked
down on” by newspaper
journalists/professors
• Instead of an “end to journalism”, this could
signal a new era
• Changing times: Huffington Post won the
Pulitzer Prize (also Politico and NYT, two)

10. Media convergence
• Term “convergence” became popular in the late 1970’s due
to Nicholas Negroponte, who used it to define the
communication overlap of 3 separate industries – the
broadcast industry, the print and the computer (Fidler, 1997).
• Henry Jenkins (2001) defines media convergence by breaking
it into 5 distinct types or processes: technological, organic (or
social), economic, cultural and global.
• Technological convergence - “….the digitalization of the
contents of all media…”; Economic convergence – is “the
horizontal integration in the entertainment industry
(synergy); social or organic – consumers navigating through
this environment; cultural – intersection of various media
technologies and global – international circulation of media.

11. New media era

12. Future role for newspapers in the digital age
• Newspapers have had to adapt to new
technologies and not attempt to compete
with them –
• The Guardian (26/11/07) published
information on the use of news sites in the UK
stating that it remained the UK’s leading
newspaper online. It showed that 18.4 million
people used Guardian Unlimited in October;
• The Telegraph had 11.1 million users while
The Times, with 12.4 million, was overtaken
by The Mail, with 13.5 million

13. New Media courses and research
• Growth of interest in new media courses and research
• Importance of introducing new media into the university
curriculum without sacrificing the basics of good writing,
critical thinking and journalistic values and ethics.
• Universities throughout the world are having to deal with the
challenge of adapting their curriculum to the digital era
• I.e. UC Berkeley School of Journalism took on a more light
approach to convergence, switching from teaching online
publishing to multimedia reporting as the main focus of their
new media curriculum (“A converged curriculum: One school’s
hard won lessons”).

14. The training of student journalists: skills and goals
• News organizations want journalists prepared for the
multimedia environment, but most of all they want
journalists with good writing and analytical skills,
critical thinking and news skills (most technology
training is still ‘on the job’).
• Students should be trained to deliver messages to
multiple audiences across platforms (print, broadcast
and online).
• However, multimedia journalists are still rare
• There is room for both “old” and “new journalists”
(the more specialised type, the one that ‘does it all’)

15. The training of student journalists: skills and goals
• Scott Sheerin quotes Karen Turner, professor in the
School of Communication and Theatre at Temple
University, has underlined 3 keys points:
• 1) Students need to understand the various theories
about mass communication;
• 2) They must obtain a diverse skill set and
• 3) Due to the changing role of the journalist as
gatekeeper, he/she must interact more with the
public.

16. Journalist’s toolbox: global reporting tools
• International Journalist’s
Network
• International Centre for
Journalists
• The Globalist
• Society of Editors
• Global Beat
• Committee to Protect
Journalists
• International Press Institute
• UK Journalism
• World Press Institute
• European Journalism Centre
• University of Texas Latin
America Journalism Page
• UT Latin American Network:
Journalism in Latin America
• Journalism UK International
links
• Newsdirectory.com
• Newslink.org

17. Questions for discussion
• What are the benefits and limits of new media in
comparison to the old?
• What are some of the ways of keeping up with the
changes in the media environment?
• How should future student journalists think about
the journalism profession? Will the profession
change in the next five to ten years?
• What role can the new media play in advancing
democracy and wider civic engagement?

18. Conclusions and future challenges
• Seek balance between the theory and the practice,
• Incorporate technology, not have resistance to it, but not let
it overwhelm the curriculum, making the study of
communications and journalism values and theory less
relevant.
• Focus on journalism values; the sociology of news; history of
journalism and international journalism; mass communication
research; reporting and investigative journalism, etc.
• * Salaverria (2011) has been critical of the emphasis on the
“technical” aspect. Technologies evolve quickly, so it is not an
issue of simply teaching how to use computer programmes.
Goal should be that students learn to practice quality
journalism in any medium, including the digital.

19. Selected bibliography
• Bardoel, Jo (1996) “Beyond Journalism: A Profession Between Information
Society and Civil Society” in Tumber, Howard (ed.) News: a reader,
Oxford: Oxford University Press
• Barnett, S. and Gaber, I. (2001) “The crisis in political journalism: an
outline of the argument” in The Westminster Tales: The Twenty-First
Century Crisis in British Political Journalism, London: Continuum, 1-11
• Bell, Emily (2012) “Huffington Post’s Pultizer prize win marks a turning
point for journalism” in The Guardian (22/04/12)
• Bhuiyan, Serajul I. (2010) “Teaching media convergence and its
challenges” in Asia Pacific Media Educator, Issue n. 20
• Karam, Francisco J.C. (2009) “Journalism in the age of the information
society, technological convergence, and editorial segmentation” in
Journalism: theory, practice and criticism, London: Sage, vol. 10. n. 1
• Kawamoto, Kevin (2003) “Digital Journalism: Emerging Media and the
Changing Horizons of Journalism” in Digital Journalism, Maryland:
Rowman and Littlefield

20. Bibliography continued
• Matos, C. (2012) “Mass media” in Wiley-Blackwell’s Encyclopedia of
Globalization, Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell
• ---------, C. (2008, 2009) “Partisanship versus professionalism: the role of
the journalist in the democratization process” in Journalism and political
democracy in Brazil, Maryland: Lexington Books
• Pryor, Larry (2005) “A converged curriculum: One school’s hard-won
lessons” in OJR: the Online Journalism Review (
www.ojr.org/ojr/stories/050224pryor/)
• Salaverria, Ramon (2011) “Online journalism meets the university: ideas
for teaching and research” in Brazilian Journalism Research, vol. 7., n. 2
• Scott Sheerin, M. (2002) “Media convergence: how are we preparing
students of journalism and mass communication to deal with it”,
Dynamics of Convergent Media academic conference at USC
• Tarcia, Lorena and Marinho, Simao Pedro (2008) “Challenges and New
Ways of Teaching Journalism in Times of Media Convergence” in Brazilian
Journalism Research, vol. 4., n. 2, semester 2, 25-53