News Gathering
Our main goal of the Quill is to provide accurate, unbiased information to our school community. The way we do that is through researching for our articles.
Before we start work on any issue, I lead a meeting to discuss story ideas. As a staff, we talk about what information we want to share with our magazine. We consult local media and look for new events in our area. We also pay attention to the national climate to make sure our articles are relevant and timely.
Right now, I am writing an article for the spring issue about the government shutdown. To explore interview ideas, I read local news articles and national news articles. Through doing so, I was able to find my angle: local jobs affected by the shutdown.
Another way we make sure to get unbiased information to our readers is through exploring all aspects of a story. For the article I wrote on sexual assault this year, I interviewed people in a variety of jobs to get medical, psychological, legal and educational perspectives on the issue.
I have learned who to interview by example. Professional sources have taught me how to write a well-rounded article.
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Sources
Into the Light
To find my sources for my article about sexual assault, I reached out to a place in town that helps victims of sexual assault, The Victim Center. There I met Alisa Garbisch. I interviewed her and asked if she knew of any good sources for me.
She pointed me in the direction of two of my other sources, Jill Patterson and Victoria Ross. I had talked to my other source, Diana Eul, for my first article on this subject. I kept in touch with her and was able to reach out again.
High Standards
For this article, I started with researching the campaign to legalize medical marijuana. I was able to get an interview with one of the leaders of the campaign, Dan Viets. He led me to an interview with Jeff Mizanskey, a man who was imprisoned for life on marijuana charges. Eventually he was pardoned, and he was a great source.
I knew I wanted sources in the legal, political and medical fields, so I did some research that led me to my other sources.
Dialect
For the spring 2019 issue, I am writing an article about dialect. I knew the basic idea of the angles I wanted to cover: accents for acting and accent modification for broadcast. Quickly, I researched accent help for actors. I found this website and used the contact form. I ended up hearing back from one of the co-founders of the website, Jim Johnson, who is also a professor at the University of Houston. He was willing to do an interview with me, and he gave me a lot of helpful information.
Interview Questions
"How has the shutdown affected the economy within the housing industry?"
Before every interview, I write questions that I want to ask, knowing that the conversation could lead to more questions. To the right is an example of the types of questions I usually ask. This specific example was from an interview with Casey Cooper, a mortgage banker, about the effects of the government shutdown on his job.
As we neared the end of our interview, I thought of another question to ask him (left). This ended up giving me some of the best information, and I am glad that I asked the question. This article on the government shutdown will be published in the spring 2019 issue.
Government Shutdown
From my Broadcast Journalism I class, I learned to always ask, "Is there anything else you would like to add?" Often the people I interview do not add anything, but when they do, I can get some of the best quotes.
This is an example from the fall 2018 issue. I interviewed Bridget Dierks, a co-chair of the Community Task Force on Facilities for my school district, and she did not have a lot of information for me. When I asked my final question, she gave me the best quote (left) that I ended up using in my article.
