There are no exams in this course; instead, there are several assignments. Each of these assignments is required to successfully pass the course.

Your grade for this class will be based on a possible total of 500 points; and your score will be directly translated into the 4.0 scale. Participation in the class and lab discussions will count towards your final grade. Regular attendance, contributions to the discussion of themes, and engagement and leadership in class exercises will result in a high participation grade.

Assignments will be turned in via e-submit or on your blog. We will create blogs at WordPress.com. Late assignments are not accepted.

Grades are determined as follows:

Assignment	Points
Weekly Blog Posts (reading review)	80
Discussion Leader (once in the quarter)	30
Individual Project	150
Group Project	150
Final Presentation	20
Participation	70

Readings. Students will create a blog (on WordPress.com) where they will reflect (not summarize!) on each week’s readings. Students are asked to write about the readings to help gain cognitive understanding of material as well as to hone analytical skills. Weekly reading assignments are not graded, except for completeness. Be sure to check your spelling and grammar, however!

• These are short (two-four paragraph) reviews of assigned reading. Each post must also include three (3) discussion questions about the assigned readings/weekly topic.

• Each regular weekly reading should be tagged “reading”.

Leading Discussion. The class will be divided into peer groups. Each peer group will serve as discussion leader once, by signing up for (or being assigned to) a class session. Each member of the group will select an outside scholarly or journalistic article that elaborates on the week’s general topic. Please use Lexis-Nexis or ProQuest or another academic database as your source. It is your responsibility to show how your selection relates to that week’s topic and readings.

Each member of the peer group will have ten (10) minutes to relate one reading; there will be additional time to engage your classmates in discussion. Be as creative as you’d like to be when presenting your information. You must create a Powerpoint presentation and link it to your student website for the course.

Before class, you must post an abstract (including full and correct citation) that links to your Powerpoint presentation and any outside source material (such as YouTube files) that you use in the presentation. You must also post a reflection on the experience to your blog by 5 pm on Friday the week that your group is responsible for leading discussion. Tag both posts “Discussion Leader.” You must create a link to these two blog post on your student website.

Course Website. As part of this course, each student will also create a web site located at http://yourblog.wordpress.com/com586/ (com586 is case sensitive!). Your site should be visually appealing and legible; you will link to your blog, your powerpoint presentation that you create for your role as discussion leader, your individual project and a bio.

Individual Project
The theme for these projects is Change.

Students will create a website on their UW student server (Dante) or they may set up an account at WordPress or TypePad specifically for this project.

1. Students first develop a concept proposal. This proposal should be posted on the student blog (tagged “proposal”) ; it is due Week 3. Class members will provide feedback using the commenting feature of the blog software.

You can think of this proposal as a pitch, 200-400 words. Consider the overall concept. Why does this style of it interest you? Who might be the intended audience (beyond the class)?

This project requires research and/or interviews. In other words, you can’t just dream up all the content out of your head!

2. Students will first prepare a textual “story” – a draft (there will be peer and instructor feedback) is due Week 5 and the final is due Week 7. It can be any genre, but it should be multiple web pages (at least three) and have illustrations of some sort on each page (graphs, photos, images). The pages should reflect principles of design, usability.

3. Students will tell the same “story” as a podcast* (4-6 minutes). This story must have at least two audio tracks other than voice. A draft (at a minimum, a full script) is due Week 7 and the final is due Week 8.
* a digital audio file created by mixing multiple digital audio tracks containing
voice and audio (a portion of a sound recording).

4. Students will tell the same story with both images and sound (and with minimal text). We will use a template from Flash Journalism (book recommended). Students will write a script and record (or have someone else record) the script. A draft is due Week 9 and the final is due finals week. The student website on WordPress should provide links to each of these projects.

(Students who wish to shoot video or produce more advanced projects are free to do so.)

Each deliverable in this project will be evaluated based on completeness, critical thought, originality and creativity.

Summary:

o Draft proposal Due: Monday 9 April, 6 pm
o Peer comments: Due Friday 13 April at 6 pm
o Version 1 – Draft due Monday 23 April, 6 pm
o Version 1 – Final due Monday 7 May, 6 pm
o Version 2 – Draft due Monday 7 May, 6 pm
o Version 2 – Final due Monday 21 May, 6 pm
o Version 3 – In Class presentation (draft) 29 May 6 pm
o Version 3 – Final due Monday 4 June at 6 pm

Group Project
Working in groups of three or four, students will pitch (to the instructor and teaching assistant) a story idea that relates to either “Seattle” or “Media Ownership”. Students should set up a group blog on WordPress for this project (to communicate with one another and the instructor). The pitch should be online (as a page, not a blog post, with comments enabled), if the group is using a blog.

Students will tell a story with both images and sound (and with minimal text). You tell the story in a traditional HTML format (text, images and downloadable sound) … or use a template from Flash Journalism … or shoot produce video. If you shoot video, it must be converted for web viewing (Quicktime, Windows Media Player, Flash).

Summary:

o Proposal Due: Monday 16 April 23 April, 6 pm
o Storyboards Due: Monday 14 May, 6 pm
o Draft Due: 21 May, 6 pm
o In-class Presentation (draft): 29 May
o Final Due: Monday 4 June at 6 pm

Final deliverables – From Week 10 Class Notes

• COM586 “page” should have links to all three stories
• COM586 “page” should have info about your discussion leader presentation
  • Abstract (tag “discussion leader”)
    • PPT should be in abstract or on COM586 page
    • Any other media used (such as YouTube clips) should be linked as well
  • Followup post (tag “discussion leader”)
• COM586 page should have link to your group project
• Complete peer evaluation by Tuesday 5 June at 6 pm
  • ExtraLocal (website)
  • Media (website)
  • Noodles (website)