The time has come in the semester to begin work on your final multimedia projects. Your homework for the remainder of the semester will be all devoted to these projects. I break down the process into many steps, setting deadlines along the way. Here is a preliminary schedule so that you can begin to pace yourselves in order to complete all the work.

STEP 1:

 Developing your story idea. Go back to the posts you wrote at the beginning of the semester and revisit the ideas you came up with on areas that you’d like to cover. Spend time thinking about specific ideas for the project and come up with TWO story pitches that you will submit to me. We will devote some class time today discussing topics before your pitches are due.

STORY PITCHES DUE: Tues., Nov. 1

 STEP 2:

 A very important step in this process is your story memo. This memo is one of your grades for the semester and you MUST complete this, following specific instructions that I will give to you next week. Basically, by the memo due date you must have completed three interviews for your project . You will include summaries of those interviews (with quotes included) as well as a definitive plan for your two multimedia features that will be required as part of your final project.

STORY MEMO DUE: Tues. Nov. 21

 STEP 3:

As part of the project, you will write an 800-1,0000-word feature story of which the first draft is due on Thurs. Dec. 1. This is a hard, fast deadline. Any delays in getting me your first drafts will result in significant drops in overall grades.

FIRST STORY DRAFT DUE: Thurs., Dec. 1

Once we get these projects launched in early November, I will introduce another schedule related to production of your multimedia.