Summation for Journalism as a Conversation

As I look back on the past three and a half months of going to class each Wednesday night, I feel as if I have learned a lot. We have covered topics such as anonymous comments, talk radio, letters to the editor, Youtube videos, and our own personal projects and all have been pretty interesting. We have learned about things that I had never heard of such as Yelp or Digg or Readit. I feel I have become more aware of things on the Internet, and feel I have developed an understanding of using the Internet and how large the Internet actually is.
Each project that we did for class was pretty interesting as well. The first project the letters to the editor actually was really different to me. I had never wrote a letter to the editor before and when I wrote the letters and saw them in my hometown newspaper and in the collegian it gave me a sense of drive and desire to have my work published all the time. The second project calling a talk radio show was pretty fun as well, I am a big sports fan and love WEEI, I had called in one time before the class to voice my opinions and will continue on calling in every once in a while when I feel my opinion's must be heard. Lastly, the final project was interesting, I had never heard of Pictory and I submitted a photo from a Red Sox game I went to a few weeks back. I hope my photo makes the editors cut but we will have to wait til June to find out. I also checked out a few students videos they submitted to Youtube and they were pretty cool as well, I have never submitted a Youtube video but would like to do it in the future. Overall the projects in the class were different and new things that I had never done before. They were interesting projects that I had never thought of doing.
I really enjoyed Journalism as a Conversation for a few reasons. I liked the open forum style that the class was presented in each week. I felt that by doing this it allowed for each person to share their own personal opinions and how they felt on a certain subject. It gave the class a nice relaxed atmosphere that allowed each student to feel comfortable. I thought by doing this some good learning was produced, everyone had a chance to talk so all opinions were covered and all angles of a certain subject were explored. I also thought that the use of a class blog was really helpful, you could check the blog each week to see your assignments, when they were due, and how long they were supposed to be. This format was very clear and concise and I wish other class that I took had this style. It was easy to understand the expectations of what was to be done. All of these reasons came together and formed a class that was fun and enjoyable (who knew college classes could be fun), and I would recommend the class to anyone in the Journalism field. Journalism as a Conversation really showed how the Journalism program here at UMass can be enjoyable and educational all at the same time.