It's not too early to start planning to come to the JEA/NSPA National High School Journalism Convention in St. Louis in November, and St Louis has a lot to offer you. Check this site for ideas and links to make your convention one of your best ever. To start off, check out this link:
http://www.explorestlouis.com/slcvc/work/clients/jea/inspiring.htm
Thursday Night Keynote
We are planning great things for you in St. Louis. One of our keynote speakers is going to be Al Tompkins from the Poynter Institute. Al Tompkins is The Poynter Institute’s Group Leader for Broadcasting and Online. More than 20,000 people a day read his online journalism story idea column “Al's Morning Meeting” on Poynter.org. Tompkins is the author of the new book Aim For The Heart: A Guide for TV Producers and Reporters, which is being used by more than 70 universities as their main broadcast writing textbook. He co-authored three editions of the Radio and Television News Directors Foundation’s “Newsroom Ethics” workbook. Al joined Poynter's faculty from his job as news director at WSMV-TV in Nashville, Tenn. For 24 years, he worked as a photojournalist, reporter, producer, anchor, assistant news director, special projects/investigations director, documentary producer, and news director. His hour-long documentary, “Saving Stefani”, was featured as a special Dateline NBC and was awarded the 1999 Clarion Award. The ten-year documentary project tells the story of a young girl that Al and a medical team found dying in a Guatemala hospital. Al has trained more than 9,000 local television news producers, reporters, photojournalists and managers in his One-Day Storytelling Workshops in 37 states. During his two and a half decades as a journalist, Al has won The National Emmy, The Peabody Award (group award), the Japan Prize, The American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel for Court Reporting, seven National Headliner Awards, two Iris Awards and the Robert F. Kennedy Award for international reporting. Al joined Poynter in 1998 after 25 years as a journalist, including serving as a reporter, investigative reporter, Director of Special Projects and Investigations and then was appointed News Director, WSMV Nashville. Under his direction, WSMV was Nashville's leading news station.
To read an excerpt go to http://www.aimfortheheart.com
Friday Afternoon Keynote
Our keynote speaker on Friday afternoon is Pulitzer Prize Jacqui Banaszynski. She is the Knight Chair in Editing at the Missouri School of Journalism and is on the visiting faculty of The Poynter Institute. She has worked as a reporter and editor for more than 30 years, most recently as associate managing editor of the The Seattle Times, where she was in charge of special projects and staff development.
Banaszynski spent 18 years as a beat and enterprise reporter, then worked as a projects editor at newspapers in the Midwest and Pacifi Northwest. While at the St. Paul Pioneer Press, her series “AIDS in the Heartland” — an intimate look at the life and death of a gay farm couple — won the 1988 Pulitzer Prize in feature writing and a national
SPJ Distinguished Service Award. She was a finalist for the 1986 Pulitzer in international reporting for coverage of the Ethiopian famine. Her work has exposed a fraudulent
developer, explored the plight of Kurdish refugees in Iraq and followed a dogsled expedition across Antarctica.
Friday Night Activities
There will be more than lots of workshops, media tours, and contest waiting for you in St. Louis. Friday, Nov.14, we have two exciting entertainment options. Two brand-new Friday night activities!
• Those who pre-purchase specially priced tickets can experience the amazing, interactive City Museum where imagination runs wild. Housed in the 600,000 square-foot former International Shoe Company, the museum is an eclectic mixture of playground, funhouse, surrealistic pavilion and architectural marvel constructed from unique, found objects. You can roast marshmallows, climb through aerial mazes, tunnels and hidden pathways or get bombarded in the ball pit. It’s interactive and it’s fun. The museum is constructed from the very stuff of the city; and, as a result, it has urban roots deeper than any other institutions. Reaching no farther than municipal borders for its reclaimed building materials, City Museum boasts features such as old chimneys, salvaged bridges, school buses, construction cranes, miles of tile and even two abandoned planes.
Specially priced tickets of $5 are available to JEA/NSPA delegates but must be purchased in advance. Admittance with the special ticket will be from 5-7p.m. and you can stay until curfew. For more information about the City Museum go to http:// www.citymuseum.org
• Everyone has an inner rock star just waiting to come roaring out. Now you’ll have a chance to let the rest of the world see that you’re the best “Rock Band” this side of the Mississippi. For the first time ever, JEA, NSPA and NCompass Media are hosting a “Rock Band” Battle of the Bands. Get your group together and compete for great prizes while playing the popular interactive video game on a live stage. Pick your band mates ahead of time, or when you get to St. Louis. The STL has never seen a rock show like this! For more information, or to sign up, follow the link from studentpressblogs.org/stl2008 and get ready for the Journalism Band Battle!