Sample Syllabus


By making the syllabus into a dynamic HTML page in the Learning Management System and making it the homepage for the class site, students land on a dynamic and engaging syllabus every time they open the LMS.

Read the Syllabus before the first day of class.
There will be a graded quiz at the end of the the first week—no joke.
There is no “syllabus day” in this class. We will jump head, feet or backside first into lessons and discussion on the first day.

Syllabus

We will build our class community through discussion, a few games, plenty of review, and a lot of fun in Fisher Auditorium in Gannett Hall every Tuesday and Thursday from 2:00 P.M. to 3:00 P.M. Please be courteous and arrive on time or a few minutes early, but don’t not come in if the complexities of life arrived you late.

Course Overview
(how this class fits into the journalism program)

Principles of Journalism in Democracy serves as a cornerstone of the journalism degree by providing an overview of the work journalism accomplishes for democratic societies from sociological, cultural, historical, legal, ethical, consumer, and practice perspectives. The course will examine the core tenets of journalism and discuss contemporary journalism's importance, possibilities, and limitations.

Course Learning Outcomes
(what you will be able to do at the end of the course)

The learning outcomes are for you (whether taking the course as a journalism degree requirement or elective for another program) to become a thoughtful practitioner, articulate advocate, reasonable critic, and informed consumer of journalism by understanding its relationship with democracy.

Learning Objectives
(questions you will be able to answer with detail at the end of each week)

  • What happens when the pool of journalists diversifies?

  • Does democracy need journalism?

  • Does lifestyle journalism count as “real” journalism?

  • Who is a journalist and who gets to define the term?

  • Is news found or crafted?

  • Who is paying for this?

  • What happens when the people formerly known as the audience can talk back?

  • Does TikTok change journalism?

  • Do you help or take a picture?

  • Will we get in trouble if we publish this?

  • Is objectivity even a thing?

  • Is artificial intelligence + big data going to replace all journalists?

Please note that this course will not provide testable answers to these questions. Rather, the purpose of the course is to prepare you to think deeply, to question purposefully, to research diligently, and to draw upon the thinking, questioning and research of others to enhance your own responses to these questions. It is not uncommon to leave class or the semester believing in two or more opposite and mutually exclusive responses.

Teaching Team

Your teaching team is made up of two Teaching Assistants (TA) and an instructor to lead the course. TA are responsible for grading your assignments (IN-PERSON Lecture Quiz, Small Group Discussion, Reflection Writing, Learning Objectives Quiz, Exams, and Final Reflection) and serve as first point of contact for questions (e.g., I have sport obligations), issues (e.g., I am feeling sick), and concerns (e.g., I don’t think my assignment was graded correctly). Your instructor will oversee all lesson, classroom discussions, assignments, grading, and is typically second in line of contact after communicating with your assigned TA.

Guidelines for Correspondence with Members of the Teaching Team

  • Before resorting to email communication, please check the Syllabus, Canvas Assignment instructions, or ask a classmate to see if a response to your query is already there.

  • Use your @missouri.edu account as non-university accounts may be filtered by Outlook and not receive a response.

  • TA do their best to reply to emails sent during working hours (9:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M., Monday–Friday) within 24 hours. Messages sent during evening hours, weekends, and holidays may take longer to reply.

TA for Students Last Name A–L

First Last (he/him) | email@missouri.edu

Hello, I am First Last, a second-year M.A. student in the Missouri School of Journalism. I have worked as a state government reporter while at Mizzou. My upcoming master’s thesis is on press criticism and news literacy. If you have an interest in pursuing a master’s degree in the Missouri School of Journalism, I would love to talk about my experience with you one on one.

I graduated from the University of Georgia in 2021 with an undergraduate degree in journalism. While at UGA, I worked for the independent student newspaper, Red & Black, and The Athens Banner-Herald. There, I covered local government and politics, and various UGA sports. I enjoy reading, golf, and listening to music in my free time.

TA for Students Last Name M–Z

First Last (she/her) | email@missouri.edu

Greetings. I am First Last, a first-year M.A. student in the Missouri School of Journalism. I am interested in government reporting and digital print media.

I am from Wisconsin and graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with an undergraduate degree in sociology. I participated in two AmeriCorps programs, Community Healthcorps and Public Allies and worked for several years as a legal assistant. I enjoy being outdoors and listening to podcasts and music in my free time.

Instructor

Cory W. MacNeil | CoryMacNeil@Mail.Missouri.edu

Student hours: Tuesday and Thursday, 3:15 P.M. to 4:00 P.M. in 246 Walter Williams Hall. Please see Cory after class to schedule an office appointment. If attending via Zoom or realize a need outside of class time, please send an email to initiate a conversation to schedule a meeting time.

In the classroom, outside the classroom, or in written communication, please address as Cory.

Typical and Productive Reasons for an Office Call

  • One-on-one preparation for an assignment or personal project (even if it is not for this class)

  • One-on-one feedback on an assignment (I can tell you a lot more in person that I can in an email)

  • Plan for future in academia (I am not a replacement for your assigned advisor, but I can supplement)

  • Plan for future job, career, and big goals

  • Send you in the right direction for counseling or assistance (I am not a trained counselor, and I should not act as one, but I can help you get to one or a university or community assistance program to solve a need)

Course Materials

Texts

There is no textbook to purchase. Small Group Discussion in Canvas requiring Craft and Davis (2016) Principles of American journalism: An introduction (2nd edition) and readings by other authors are embedded as links to PDF within Canvas Assignment instructions.

Canvas Use

  • Course schedule (see Assignments tab in Canvas)

  • IN-CLASS Lecture Quiz (see Assignments tab in Canvas)

  • Assignment instructions and submission (see Assignments tab in Canvas)

  • Announcements

  • Track grade/progress

  • Links to Support and Policy

Learning Accommodations

The goal of the University of Missouri is to ensure an inclusive learning environment for you. The University of Missouri Disability Center provides services and accommodations for you to participate fully in the learning experience and to experience equitable evaluation of your performance. Anyone (including online students) with a documented disability can contact the Disability Center to establish an Accommodation Plan. Documented disabilities include hearing, vision, mobility, learning and attention, psychological health, and physical health. Your accommodations are implemented with your input to maximize the learning experiences. The MU Disability Center keeps information about your needs confidential.

Audio and Video Recording in Class

In this class, you may not make audio or video recordings of course activity, except students permitted to record as an accommodation under section 240.040 of the Collected Rules.

Class discussion and participation in Principles of Journalism in Democracy will require you to share with the class how you see, interact with, and understand the world and the people in it. University is a place to learn not only about the world, but for you to learn about yourself and grow as you begin to see how other people see and understand how other people understand. It is often the case that in a classroom environment where you are pushing the boundaries of your own knowledge and learning things that are truly new to you, you will say things that even in the moment of speaking aloud you self-discover you don’t believe what you are saying. Unfortunately, that important moment of insight takes place inside your head; what occurred on the outside and is recordable is the very statement you no longer believe. Knowing that what you say aloud in class could end up on YouTube or TikTok in a matter of seconds will have a chilling effect in the classroom. Therefore, to create an academically open (as in, insert foot here) and safe environment (as in, good thing that dumb statement won’t follow me forever) only students with learning accommodations may record audio and/or video in class—and that only to be used for study, not TikTok fodder.

Attendance

You must attend every class, full stop.

To extend individual attendance responsibility to the class as a group, days in which attendance tracked through IN-CLASS Lecture Quiz achieves 90% or greater will retroactively record as 100% attendance in Canvas for all class members. Additionally, the average attendance percentage across the entire semester will become the baseline grade for the Final Reflection for all members of the class (e.g., if the class achieves 80% attendance across the semester, as long as you turn in a Final Reflection, you will receive a grade on that assignment no lower than 80%).

Zoom Attendance/Recording for Substantial Reasons

Remote attendance via Zoom will be available to accommodate you only if you cannot attend the class in-person for a substantial reason (e.g., sickness or caring for a family member). Send an email with the subject line UNABLE TO ATTEND CLASS to your assigned TA before class and a one-sentence reason for Zoom attendance. Please send your request as soon as you feel sick as it is better to request Zoom then not need it if you recover in time to attend in person than to wait until the last hours to see how you feel. To increase your chances of receiving the Zoom information in time, Cc the other TA. Your TA will respond with a Zoom link, which is a way of enforcing that only those who have requested permission attend over Zoom (i.e., the TA will know if you should be online for IN-CLASS Lecture Quiz points). Since recovering from sickness or caring for someone who is sick may mean not attending class in synchronous time, the TA will follow up by sending a link to the recorded lecture. If you are attending class through Zoom synchronously (live Zoom), you will participate in the IN-PERSON Lecture Quiz through Canvas. If you are attending class through Zoom asynchronously (recorded Zoom), you reply to your TA a final time with your response.

Please enter the Zoom room with your microphone muted and display first and last name. The use of your camera is optional.

University Excused Absence

If you have contractual obligations to the university (i.e., sports), you have the responsibility to inform your TA along with communication from faculty (e.g., the coach) of obligations that require you to miss class to establish new deadlines for assignments.

Internships, meetings, holiday travel, employment, and other situations are not considered emergency and therefore do not qualify for credit as university excused absence.

Emergency Absence

If you are in need of emergency absence, or you have family members with medical emergencies (e.g., hospitalization, appearance in a court of law, health conditions which require bedding ordered by a physician, or death in the family) you have the responsibility to contact your TA in a timely manner (emergency comes first!) to establish new deadlines for assignments.

Internships, meetings, holiday travel, employment, and otherwise non-threatening situations are not considered emergency and therefore do not qualify for credit as emergency absence.

Assignments (500 points)

The best viewing of Assignments in Canvas is SHOW BY TYPE, which is not the default, but will allow you to see all assignments separated into weeks rather than one long—and possibly overwhelming—list.

IN-PERSON Lecture Quiz (22 points)

At the end of each lecture you will open Canvas (so, bring laptop or other Canvas capable device to class) to the Assignments tab to answer a question posed in the presentation slide (i.e., you must be in class to read the question). You earn 1 point for being present in class (or over Zoom with permission), not for the correct answer–though the quiz questions come from the same bank as Learning Objectives Quiz and Learning Objectives Exams, so, it is worth taking note of the correct answer. Since the IN-PESON Lecture Quiz is a means of taking attendance in a large lecture, if you take the quiz outside of class (gaming the system) you commit an academic dishonesty.

If you choose to focus on class by foregoing the distraction of electronic devices you will participate by writing your name on a slip of paper provided in class and hand to the instructor at the end of class.

Small Group Discussion (110 points)

The large lecture class will break into small discussion groups on Canvas with instructions prompting an initial post of 150–200 words about the assigned reading (Craft & Davis or other author) or activity. You will then respond twice to other group members with 75–100 words. As an alternative to writing, and to make the discussion posts feel more like a conversation taking place in classroom, you may choose to record and post an audio or video file as your post. You are free to use all communication tools available in Canvas and smartphone, etc. as part of your posts—get creative.

There is no rule on when to make your initial post, but remember the longer you wait to offer your initial post the longer the group members must wait to have something to consider and reply. If you are coming close (you decide when that is) to the deadline of the Small Group Discussion and you are the only one in the group to post leaving you without anyone to whom you can reply, go ahead, and reply to yourself—not unlike a face-to-face class when sometimes there is only one student ready to respond.

Reflective Writing (30 points)

In 50 to 75 words, you will describe individual learning from the week's Learning Objectives about the role of journalism to support democracy. The point of reflective writing is not to summarize the lecture, presentation slides, or the additional readings, but to write your own thoughts—that is the difference between summarizing and reflecting.

Attentive students will use the weekly Reflective Writing as a gathering start point for the Final Reflection.

Learning Objectives Quiz (88 points)

This weekly quiz pulls from the major ideas and concepts from the Learning Objectives of the week in eight questions with a 15-minute time limit.

Learning Objective Quiz and Learning Objective Exams pull their questions from the same question bank.

Learning Objective Exams (200 points)

On the week of an exam the instructor will host an optional review session on Tuesday during regular class time. There is no class on Thursday during exam weeks.

Learning Objective Quiz and Learning Objective Exams pull their questions from the same question bank.

Final Reflection (50 points)

As the culminating assignment, you will write a 750-to-800-word Final Reflection on your learning through lecture, reading, discussion, activities, and critical thinking about the role of journalism in democracy. Attentive students will use the weekly Reflective Writing as a gathering start point for the Final Reflection.

Grading

If you feel an assignment has been graded inaccurately, you must initiate a request for review with the TA within one week of the date the grade was published to Canvas Gradebook.

Late Work

All assignments have a published due date and time in Canvas. For every 24-hour period an assignment enters after the due date and time the value of the final grade decreases by 10% until the assignment is worth zero points. The class and all assignments submissions close at 11:59 on May 12.

Emergencies do occur, and if an emergency has kept you from meeting the scheduled deadline, you are encouraged to contact your TA as soon as possible with the general details of the situation. The TA have discretion to grant an extension.

If a technical issue with Internet connection or Canvas outage prevents you from turning in an assignment on time, it is your responsibility to contact your TA to describe the situation.