What Is Campus Journalism?

It had been a long and laborious semester for me and, as I believe, for other students. After two weeks, we will be facing another semester of brain brawls and nerve fights.

I checked my university check-list and I saw that we will be having two JOURNALISM courses this coming semester, one being a general education course and the other, a major subject.

As I usually do before I plunge myself into a new set of subjects, I see to it that I get an overview or a full grasp, if possible, of all the subjects that I will take. This time I decided to start it with JOURNALISM.

As it would probably be, we'll take JOURNALISM in general and then, Campus Journalism as our main focus. This is because we are education students.

I'll be posting more about JOURNALISM after this.

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To begin with (cliche), let's define Journalism and get to know more about it in surface.

Journalism is defined as the collection, preparation and distribution of news and related commentary and feature materials through such media as pamphlets, newsletters, newspapers, magazines, radio, motion pictures, television, books, blogs, webcasts, podcasts and e-mail. Originally, the term refers to news and current events printed in newspapers or any such form but due to the advent of technology (radio, television, internet, etc.) in the 20th century the term broadened until it arrived at its current meaning.

The term traces its origin from the Anglo-French word jurnal (daily) and the Latin word diurnalis (of the day). 

It must also be noted that the earliest known publication of journalistic nature is the Acta Diurna from ancient Rome. It was believed to have been published in the 59th century and continued to be published daily since then.The Acta Diurna contained recorded important political and social events and was hung in prominent places to be read by people.

In China, a circulation was published by the court to serve as report issued to government officials called bao (report). This publication which started from the Tang Dynasty continued to be published in various forms and names until the end of the Qing Dynasty in 1911. There was a time when the bao was said to have been published in all villages, not only for government officials, for public dissemination. 

The first published newspapers were seen in German cities and in Antwerp about 1609. The first English news paper, The Weekly Newes, was published in 1622. One of the first daily newspapers, The Daily Courant, appeared in 1702.

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Since the school, in a pragmatic view, is a miniature of the outside, it has to imitate what really is happening in the real world, to bring it closer to the learners and to train them in their social functions and interactions in the future.

This is why we have school elections and student governments. We train the young ones about leadership, suffrage and responsibility. This is also the reason why we force uniforms in secondary schools. We train them about formality and professionalism.

Considering all the examples mentioned above, it is but fair to train them about freedom of expression and right to information. This is why we have Campus Journalism. We train the young ones of the art of politics: to criticize what is inefficient and to suggest improvements. We train them about their rights to express themselves in media or in ways not threatening to national security and progress. We train them that all people have rights to be informed of what is happening around their concerns.

Above all these, through Campus Journalism, we train the young ones about honesty, integrity, loyalty and fairness. They learn how to be involved and productive for the society.