Assignment #1: Reported Story
Reported stories will be due by class time on March 28. You will publish them here on the class blog. Your story/angle should deal in some way with a NYC-area community and its relationship with its waterways.
At least one photo should accompany your story. It should be about 600 words, with direct quotes from at least three sources. You can take the photo yourself, or you can use an image given to you by a source (as long as it is correctly attributed), or you can use publicly-available renderings of proposed projects.
After you submit your story, you will receive a grade along with some editor feedback. You will have one week from when you receive that feedback to make changes and re-file the story for a chance at a higher grade.
Due date: Reported stories will be due by class time on March 28.
Assignment #2: Case Study Presentations
Students will give a PowerPoint presentation describing an important climate change topic and how it’s been covered. This should be a 15-minute presentation that ends in a discussion question to engage the class.
To make sure you have enough stories and material to draw on for a presentation, you might want to pick a topic that is broad enough to have generated a fair amount of recurring coverage. So for instance, you could choose something like the California wildfires; or the United Nations’ role in brokering climate agreements over the years; or climate migration in one of the worst-hit countries (Bangladesh or Ethiopia, for instance); urban planning in a city that is increasingly under threat, like Miami; the impact on the coffee industry around the world, both current and projected; or climate activist movements among younger generations, led by people like Greta Thunberg. Feel free to play video or radio clips in addition to showing us written news stories.
Alternatively, you can choose to do a deep dive on an individual news story, like the example Prof. Zarnoch gave.
Due date: Case study presentations will be completed on the days you’ve signed up for.
Syllabus
You can find the course syllabus here. Please keep in mind that this syllabus is subject to change based on the availability of guest speakers, how the pace of the course seems to be progressing, etc.