Cabrillo journalism chair discusses future of program - Santa C...

The fast-changing newspaper industry is searching for a new success formula. Cabrillo College's journalism program is trying to do the same.

[Jeremy Karafin]

While 1,000 students are involved in Student Media at UCSC, Cabrillo students would have a lot more to look forward to if UCSC's journalism minor had not been cut. It is a tragedy that the journalism minor and its courses were cut, just as it is a tragedy that Cabrillo is considering cuts in the number of journalism courses it currently offers. Both UCSC and Cabrillo need to understand the extreme importance of educating students about good journalism. It is our fault as a society that we don't have more real journalists like UCSC alumni Dana Priest to actually uncover the truth.

[disabuser]

How remarkable to hear a professor use the word "diversity" in anything other than the near-obsessional meaning of the word in academia. But I question the notion that journalism as promoted in academia is about the truth. I wish that were true. I would emphasize the development of the skills of logic as well as the identification and self-awareness with regards to bias. People will need different media skills to work in the industry. But the most important skills, like the ability to reason, to see clearly, to ask the right questions, to analyze and to distill the essence of complicated events and make them accessible to their audience are persistent in regards to good journalism, new or old.