Thoughts on J-School

In advance of a presentation next week on new media at UA's Lemke School, this is the first of a series of notes as I prep.

We can’t assume that we can’t live without journalism school. Creative destruction is a spectre that hangs over the hallowed halls just as it does the mass media.

America did just fine through the penny press period and the rise of the mass media. It was a vocational field, where young talent was brought up through a guild-like system.

In a digital age that can lead to the simultaneous deconstruction of the newsroom and the metastasis of news sources on-line, where are the editors, the columnists, the older beat reporters who can instruct. Here is where j-school steps into the breech.