I finished my journalism degree

This month, July of 2022, I completed the master's degree in journalism program that I started in 2019 at Ball State University.

My diploma is not yet in hand but all course work is completed and all credit requirements are satisfied. I'm quite proud to be at this milestone, and I'm grateful for what I've learned and experienced along the way. Here are a few highlights and reflections:

The courses

My program focus was on "reporting and storytelling," which covered a range of topics and disciplines including reporting and storytelling itself, a lot of theory and analysis work, developing and practicing my academic research skills, learning data journalism tactics and tools, exploring past, present and future models of journalism, thinking about what voices and perspectives are missing or under-represented in local news, and more.

Here's a full list of the courses I took:

  • Studies in Journalism and Communication Theory
  • Social and Cross-Media Storytelling
  • Journalistic Judgments
  • Data Journalism
  • Emerging Technologies
  • Diversity & Media
  • Intro to Statistical Methods
  • Media Audiences and Content Strategy
  • Social Media Analytics and Engagement
  • Capstone Creative Project (2 semesters)
  • Evolution of Remote/Distributed Newsrooms

That list represents three years of study, hundreds of book and article chapters read, hundreds of pages written for various papers and assignments, hundreds of hours of lectures and presentations, various articles, podcasts, websites and videos completed, and a lot of time and energy.

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