US Army Journalist - Course - Survival Books

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Lesson 3, Learning Event 1GATHERING THE NEWSThe Department of Defense "Stars and Stripes" Pacific and Europeaneditions and the Army's Southern Command News in Panama are theonly military papers which routinely cover national andinternational news. Most Army newspapers deal with local andmilitary news which affects their post, community or leadership.Army newspapers are prohibited from publishing articles whichconcern partisan politics. Writers should become familiar with therequirements and restrictions of Army Regulation 360-81, CommandInformation Program.There are several methods of ensuring that the newspaper covers allsegments of the community.THE BEAT SYSTEMEditors may assign reporters in a beat system. Beat systems may beeither geographical or functional in nature. For instance, areporter may be assigned to cover everything which happens in the2nd Brigade area. This is a geographical beat. Or, a reporter maybe assigned to cover anything related to housing, barracks andconstruction --a functional beat. Each reporter becomes familiarwith the personnel and the news sources in his area and visits themregularly to find out what has happened or what is planned.It may be necessary to set up special beat systems to cover largeor complex events. For example, an Armed Forces Day may require aspecial beat system for several days preceding, during and afterthe event.The keys to a successful beat system are dependability and apersonable attitude. A dependable reporter gets to know his newssources and visits them regularly. If a reporter is assigned tocover post training activities, he should become acquainted withthe post or unit G-3 staff and with the training officers andnoncommissioned offices of the major subordinate units. He shouldarrange a convenient time for visiting these people and keepappointments faithfully. When he does, his visits will beanticipated and his sources may have information prepared for himin advance.A personable attitude is important because the reporter whoantagonizes his sources, either by his behavior or appearance, iscutting his own throat. The reporter's job is19
Lesson 3, Learning Event 1to develop contacts who will lead him to newsworthy events, not todiscourage people from talking to him. The reporter should alwaysbe polite, punctual, neat, and he should display proper militarycourtesy.Editors might use a combination of geographical and functional(sometimes called subject) beats. The key is to fix responsibilityon the writers to ensure adequate, balanced reporting on allaspects of the military community.Editors may also combine the beat system with special assignments,or they may operate their newsgathering system on a straightassignment basis only. A reporter might be given a generalassignment to see what the 2nd Brigade is doing this week. Or, hemight be given a special assignment to cover the first Abrams tanksbeing delivered to the 2nd Brigade.To ensure that responsibility for an assignment has been placed onthe reporter, and to pass along the essential coordinatinginstructions to the reporter, editors should use assignment sheets.The assignment sheet (See Figure 3-1) indicates the topic, possiblepoints of contact, known information about the event, a suggestedslug (the administrative title of the article used in tracking thearticle through the production phase of publication), and thedeadline. The assignment sheet may be a preprinted form or it canbe a slip of paper torn from a notebook. Both the editor and thejournalist should have a copy of the assignment sheet.Regardless of which system is used, editors should NOT restrain theinitiative of their reporters. New journalists need guidance, buttheir initiative to find and cover-(report) news must also bedeveloped.However, journalists must keep the editor informed about thestories on which they are working. Editors must be able to planwhat their paper is going to use and what the lead stories will be.Keeping the editor informed may also save the writer numerous hoursif the editor has already assigned someone else to cover the story.20
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