ACE Spectrum

Critical Thinking and Reporting With Your Heart Are Part of Journalism Education

Posted by Martha Sessums on Nov 22, 2016 in ACE Learning Center, ACE School Report, Continuing Education | 0 comments

By Ben Trefny, News Director, KALW Public Radio

First off, I want to acknowledge the sea-change this country is about to take. Donald Trump’s election as President of the United States revealed the deep frustration of many people in this country — something very important to recognize. But his campaign, the revelations that came during it, and his statements about what may come have also made enormous swaths of this nation’s population anxious and even fearful. Our work as journalists, teachers and in providing a critically thinking space in our community will be even more vital in the months and years to come, and we are strongly committed to fulfilling our role.

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We devoted extraordinary resources to local and state election coverage, as I’ve detailed in previous blog posts. On election night, I hosted a live, two-hour conversation featuring guests from the San Francisco Public Press and the East Bay Express along with calls from our audience and live field reports and updates on returns. While the conversation largely revolved around what was happening across the country, we were able to inform our audience about how the dozens and dozens of ballot measures that will change life in the Bay Area.

We had a big team of contributors from our news department with many current and past members of the Audio Academy, including Angela Johnston (’14), Jeremy Jue (’17), Greer McVay (’17), Colin Peden (’15), Cari Spivack (’17), Liza Veale (’15), and Eli Wirtschafter (’16). It was a real-time experience of working hard under pressure during an emotional time. The team did a fantastic job, and they helped produce an excellent program with plenty of follow up reporting the next day.

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Here’s some praise that we drew in the last week from Mwende Hahesy, production coordinator at the nationally syndicated investigative reporting program Reveal:

“I’ve very much appreciated the hyperlocal reporting y’all have been doing throughout the complete take over of election coverage. The piece on Measure Q (reported by Liza Veale, ’15) and the interview with the leader of La Misa Negra (as part of our Sights & Sounds project) helped ground me in my community. Keep up the great work!”

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Thoughts from Academy fellow Cari Spivack

On the first day of Audio Academy, Ben Trefny told us about the KALW’s mission statement: to create joyful, informative media that engages people across the divides in our community — economic, social, and cultural. He said that at Crosscurrents, we tell the stories of the underserved, the people who don’t get a chance to tell their story. Overnight, this mission has become more urgent than it was 24 hours ago.

It is November 9, 2016, the morning after the election. I am in the KALW newsroom after spending last evening here, helping the newsroom provide live coverage of the election results. The mood here has filled with emotion and conviction. There is a resolve to reach our listeners and tell them we will continue, now, more than ever, to tell their stories. We are having honest discussions about the stories we missed telling and the stories that are still out there needing to be told.

When I started Audio Academy 10 weeks ago, it was with a light heart. I was intellectually challenged by the idea of telling stories on the radio: learning the craft of storytelling, the mechanics of sound editing, journalistic ethics, writing for radio… Being here last night and today, surrounded by a news crew who cares passionately about this work, I have been moved by the dialog here, a dialog likely occurring in newsrooms across the country: how much should your heart be part of your reporting? Is there now a new line?

This is another important moment for journalism. I am grateful to be part of this discussion and to navigate these complicated questions, not just for myself, but for the all the people whose stories I have yet to tell.

Audio Academy Alums Help Educate Voters While Freshman Learns the Magic of a Great Story

Posted by Martha Sessums on Nov 8, 2016 in ACE Learning Center, ACE School Report, Continuing Education | 0 comments

By Ben Trefny, News Director, KALW Public Radio

This has been one heck of an election season, hasn’t it?!

I just want to give a quick shout out to all of the Audio Academy members past and present who contributed to KALW‘s exhaustive election coverage. Our station did more than it ever did before — and it had to, since there were so many local and state ballot measures to consider — and the training we’ve provided for our Academy fellows really helped them step up and be heard. Check out some examples:

• Angela Johnston (’14): Why your signature is worth so much this election season
• Jeremy Dalmas ( ’14): What exactly are these municipal bonds on your ballot?
• Liza Veale (’15): Proposition Q: This would ban homeless tent encampments. Opponents say there’s an alternative.
• Hannah Kingsley-Ma (’15): Proposition 51: Debate about the best way to fix California schools.
• Eli Wirtschafter (’16): Measure RR: BART asks voters to fund a major rebuild

Altogether, our team produced nearly 50 stories about election-related issues to help voters understand their ballots. And at last check, we’ve had more than 10,000 clicks on our elections homepage, showing that the audience is really listening to what we have to say.

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While our training is really making a significant difference here in the Bay Area, our work is rippling outward to reach an increasingly national audience. We heard news last week that our friends at San Quentin won the Radiotopia Podquest! Really extraordinary — there were more than 1,500 applicants — and well earned! It means that a national podcasting network will support the work of inmate storytellers, many of whom have trained with KALW on the San Quentin Prison Report. The new project is called Ear Hustle, and it really got its hop from KALW. They acknowledge that in this article. Check it out!

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Check in with Academy alum Jack Detsch:

Audio Academy alum Jack Detsch (’15) has been working at a particularly pertinent and interesting job since he left KALW. He’s writing about cybersecurity for the Christian Science Monitor. His recent articles include:

After blaming Russia for DNC hack, Obama weighs response

DHS cyberchief to young hackers: Help us protect the grid

After bonnet attacks, stakes rise for security in connected things

Jack’s a great writer and reporter, and it’s wonderful to see his work reaching an international audience. A few years ago, he was building his skills in Oakland reporting largely on wage equity issues with stories like this one about the complexities of raising the minimum wage:

Living wage fight explodes in East Oakland

Congratulations on your successes, Jack!

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Thoughts from Academy Fellow Kanwalroop Singh:

A month into the Audio Academy, I was assigned to write my first pitch for my first ever radio story, which was supposed to focus on the Portola neighborhood of San Francisco. I found myself completely lost and unsure of what to do. I had barely ever been to this neighborhood and I knew nothing about it. I walked up and down the main street of the neighborhood, scanning the storefronts and the streets, hoping desperately that a story would appear before my eyes like magic. It didn’t. I entered shop after shop and asked questions at random to storeowners and customers and strangers. It was painful. Especially because I grew up very shy, taught never to talk to or trust strangers. It was a tactic of survival passed down by the traumatic experiences of my parents. And now I was doing that very thing that I dreaded all my life. After an hour of this, I happened upon an herbal store in the neighborhood. I knew there was some magic there. I trusted my instinct and I found the seed of what would bloom into my first story–which I am working on reporting now.

At the Audio Academy, I have found that I am challenged intensely and supported intensely. I am nurtured and encouraged. I am allowed to wander and take the time to learn. I struggle and panic about my assignments, but because I can feel that others have faith in me, I learn to have faith in myself. This is the single most important thing I have learned thus far. Indeed, I have learned to fact check, pitch, interview, and gather sound–but mostly I have learned that all of these things are impossible if I don’t believe that I can do them. I find the whole experience of the Audio Academy is like looking for a story, it requires trying and trying despite the difficulty of it and the not-knowing-what-you-are-doing, but inevitably there is learning and magic and a great story waiting at the end.

Whoot! The KALW Audio Academy Experience Ranges From First Audio Feature to Oscar’s Shortlist for Doc Shorts

Posted by Martha Sessums on Nov 1, 2016 in ACE Learning Center, Continuing Education | 0 comments

By Ben Trefny, News Director, KALW Public Radio

We’re about seven weeks into this year’s Audio Academy, and we’re transitioning from fundamental training to practical production. In fact, our first feature from this class reached the airwaves this month, when Cari Spivack reported on a demonstration in front of San Francisco’s City Hall, in which several people set up tents on the sidewalk to call attention to the inconsistencies with the city’s ongoing homeless policies. Cari did a really terrific job of thinking on her feet, gathering sound of a woman and her son setting up a tent, recording clear interviews, and getting her microphone in the middle of a conversation between the protest organizer and San Francisco’s head of homeless services. It’s a quick story that gives a nice sense of place, and you can listen to it right here.

Cari and the other Academy fellows have been putting together pitches profiling the Portola neighborhood, just down the hill from KALW. It’s a good assignment, because it helps them (and us) get to know our community better, it’s easy access, and its collective work.

Meanwhile, our weekly seminars continue. In recent weeks, we presented an hour-long class on the art of the pitch, showing fellows the best way to market their ideas to us and other outlets. We followed that with an hour on the art of the interview and another hour presenting strategies on editing interviews. This week we’re discussing ethics in journalism. We’re interspersing those lessons with one-on-one work with our audio editing software, and of course the personal attention our fellows get from their individual mentors.

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Check in with Academy alum Daphne Matziaraki:

Audio Academy alumna Daphne Matziaraki (’14) is racking up honors for her work as a documentary filmmaker. This week, her non-fiction movie “4.1 Miles”, about the refugee crisis and told from the perspective of a member of the Greek coast guard, made a list of 10 Finalists for the Academy Award for short subject documentary.  Watch it here, but be warned … it’s graphic and powerful. We’ll find out in January whether she’ll be one of the five nominees for an Oscar!

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Thoughts from Academy fellow Boawen Wang:

I’m humbled to think that KALW extended the opportunity for me to learn how to produce joyful and impactful news, to someone who came from a nonexistent journalist background but simply passionate about learning. This has truly been one of the most immersive experiences I’ve participated so far in my life and I’m proud to share this experience with such genuine folks. I look forward to honing my storytelling craft every week through each mistake I make, each piece of feedback I’m gifted, and each clarifying moment in which radio production starts making more sense.