No Diversity in Baseball?

In a recent New York Times video, Diversity in baseball was questioned. Now we aren't talking about players in Major League Baseball (MLB) because the players in this league come from all over the world making it one of the most diverse pro sports leagues. In this video they are talking about it's coaches. This reporter has said 66% of it's first base coaches are minorities and only 20% of it's third base coaches are minorities. This is a problem because 1/3 of the managers (Head Coach) in the MLB were third base coaches before they took that next step to become the head coach. Ten out of the thirty managers were third base coaches. Looking into this, it is a bit of an issue, but there are many managers in the MLB who come from different backgrounds. I would like to see more diversity in third base coaches because that is the "stepping stone" to become a manager in the MLB. For more information and the video Click Here

Are Steroids Causing Kidney Disease?

On the New York Times Video Blog, I found an interesting video about a weightlifter, Patrick Antonecchiam, who admitted to steroid use, and eventually found himself with a kidney disease. The disease led to the end of his weightlifting career. It is set up as an interview, with the story being told by Antonecchiam himself. Surprisingly enough, he said that he didn't regret his steroid use, as his lifestyle was focused on his desire to get stronger and the steroids helped him do that.

The reason that I chose this as a controversial topic is because steroid use among all athletes, not just bodybuilders and weightlifters, is a very important issue. The findings that steroid use can lead directly to kidney disease as it did in Antonecchiam's case is just one of the many arguments against steroid use, and may be used as a reason to increase drug testing among athletes.

To see the whole video on Patrick Antonecchiam, click here.

Problems on the Lake of Baikal

On the New York Times website, there was a video on the enviroment in Russia. It was called the "Trouble on Russia's Lake Baikal"

This video is about a factory that, to many enviromentalists, is poluting one of the natural wonders on Earth, Lake Baikal. Enviromentalists fight to have the factory closed to stop destroying the natural glory, but citizens who live there oppose that idea, for that factory is pretty much the ONLY job available for many miles.
This video is controversial because it shows the two sides of the problem, which is still going on today, and not many know what to do. For now the factory is again open, coming from the fact the it had been shut down for a while, but then again reopened by the Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin.
The reported presents this information by video taping, and talking about, both of the sides of the problem. He explains the reason for both parties, and let them explain them selves too. He also included the history of the factory and the town that proved how important the factoy is to the people, and the rest of their economy.


To see the Video on the NYTimes website CLICK HERE.

By Anna A.

Controversial Subject?

The semester closes on Friday so do this homework assignment and end on a positive note!
Your assignment will be to find a NYTIMES video that "covers" a controversial subject.
Make sure to:
Create a link to the video
Discuss why the video is controversial and how the reporter presents the information.
I look forward to seeing your blogs & videos!! We will watch them in class on Friday!!

On the Media Matters Conference, a while before we had to chose a couple of classes that we may like, and a few weeks after that we went to the conference its self. There were many different classes that we were put in, and each taught us about the topic in description, teaching about the right way to write, speak, ask questions, or even do a job. In each class there was a professor that taught in U Mass. Most classes were about 45 minutes long, but some were for for an hour and 30 minutes. Some conferences were for teachers, while some were for just students, but most were for all. I found the Media Matters Conference interesting, and hope that I can go back there next year to learn some more.

Media Matters Conference

On Thursday November 4, 2010 I attended the media matters conference. This conference was held at the UMass- Boston campus. This conference was aimed to help and teach high school students with many different areas in journalism and broadcasting. I attended a few workshops. One was called "Teaching Generation Text to Talk on TV". This was taught by Jimmy Myers, a former sportscaster from various networks. He know runs a company that helps kids get into the broadcasting business. Also, Bob Halloran was also there. He is the current sportscaster for channel 5 news. I got a chance to talk with Mr. Halloran about reporting sports and he gave me some very helpful insight.

I also took a workshop called "Preparing for a Job in Broadcast". Th=is was taught but current Fox news anchor Mark Ockerbloom. He told us his story of his journey though the world of broadcasting and how he ended up where he is today. He also showed us some clips of him broadcasting different styles of stories. Such as, field reporting, in studio reporting, hard news, soft news and debates.

Overall, I enjoyed my time there and it really helped me because I would like to pursuit a career in broadcasting. And for anyone else interested in broadcasting, I would suggest taking Ms. O'Grady's journalism class, Ms. Ventura's TV & News Production class, and going to this conference in upcoming years.

U Mass Writing Conference

Today I went to a writing conference at U Mass with some people from my t.v production class. It was very interesting and informative. The classes I got were one about responding to writing, one about conducting an interview and one about investigative journalism. The one about investigative journalism interested me the most because I want to be a journalist. The person who taught us was Sean Murphy who works at Suffolk. He is an investigative journalist who works for the Boston Globe and he explained to us that an investigative journalist has to investigate for some period of time and then write a story about it. It is usually about government officials.
My responding to writing one was very interesting as well and my presenter taught as all about good types of feedback to give to writers you may respond to in your class. He told us the most important part of responding is to give positive feedback and tell the writer about what they did right.
My other class was one about conducting interviews. It was really good and informative. The only problem was that the teacher was like 20 minutes late so I didnt get as much time in the class as I would have liked. She explained to us how the most important part of an interview is to be prepared and to make sure you understand what you are talking about
Overall I really enjoyed they day and learned a lot from it.
HERE IS A LINK TO THE WEB SITE