Course Coordinator:Peter English (penglish@usc.edu.au) School:School of Business and Creative Industries
UniSC Sunshine Coast |
Blended learning | Most of your course is on campus but you may be able to do some components of this course online. |
Online |
Online | You can do this course without coming onto campus, unless your program has specified a mandatory onsite requirement. |
Please go to unisc.edu.au for up to date information on the
teaching sessions and campuses where this course is usually offered.
This course is production-focused and designed to prepare you to work in a modern online newsroom. You will work to multiple strict editorial deadlines and editorial standards to produce publishable material across media. You will work in ways that reflect practises in the media industry.
| Activity | Hours | Beginning Week | Frequency |
| Blended learning | |||
| Learning materials – Interactive online learning activities. | 1hr | Week 1 | 12 times |
| Tutorial/Workshop 1 – Scheduled face to face workshops and news conference | 2hrs | Week 1 | 12 times |
| Online | |||
| Learning materials – Interactive online learning activities. | 1hr | Week 1 | 12 times |
| Tutorial/Workshop 1 – Scheduled online workshops and news conference (Recorded). | 2hrs | Week 1 | 12 times |
300 Level (Graduate)
12 units
| Course Learning Outcomes On successful completion of this course, you should be able to... | Graduate Qualities Completing these tasks successfully will contribute to you becoming... | |
| 1 | Demonstrate production efficiency. | Creative and critical thinker |
| 2 | Produce material for publication that is created ethically and professionally. | Ethical |
| 3 | Connect with the regional community to generate content for publication. | Sustainability-focussed |
| 4 | Produce news of a publishable standard. |
Creative and critical thinker Engaged |
Refer to the UniSC Glossary of terms for definitions of “pre-requisites, co-requisites and anti-requisites”.
Not applicable
Not applicable
Not applicable
Not applicable
Not applicable
Standard Grading (GRD)
| High Distinction (HD), Distinction (DN), Credit (CR), Pass (PS), Fail (FL). |
Students will be provided with early feedback that reviews their relevant knowledge and gives them an indication of what to expect and at what standard they are expected to work in this course via an online formative quiz.
| Delivery mode | Task No. | Assessment Product | Individual or Group | Weighting % | What is the duration / length? | When should I submit? | Where should I submit it? |
| All | 1 | Artefact - Professional, and Written Piece | Individual | 20% | 250-300 words |
Week 5 | Online Assignment Submission with plagiarism check |
| All | 2 | Artefact - Professional, and Written Piece | Individual | 40% | four news stories x 250 words |
Week 10 | Online Assignment Submission with plagiarism check |
| All | 3 | Artefact - Professional, and Written Piece | Individual | 40% | Online news story 250-300 words plus photo. Radio news story of 200 words and recording. Social media post including original audio visual content. |
Week 12 | Online Assignment Submission with plagiarism check |
| All - Assessment Task 1:News conference | ||||||||||||||||
| Goal: | For you to produce a publishable news story resulting from a news conference |
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| Product: | Artefact - Professional, and Written Piece | |||||||||||||||
| Authorship Statement: | ||||||||||||||||
| Format: | You will attend a news conference as directed. You will identify newsworthy elements, ask questions and add information from your own research and other interviews to prepare a publishable online news story to a tight deadline. |
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| Criteria: |
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| Generic Skills: | Communication, Organisation, Applying technologies, Information literacy |
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| All - Assessment Task 2:Court and council reporting | ||||||||||||||||
| Goal: | To produce online news stories as a result of engagement with the court and council news rounds that are newsworthy and in the public interest. |
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| Product: | Artefact - Professional, and Written Piece | |||||||||||||||
| Authorship Statement: | ||||||||||||||||
| Format: | You will attend court and council sessions in pursuit of news stories for publication. You will produce news stories that are accurate, balanced and of a professional standard. |
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| Criteria: |
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| Generic Skills: | Communication, Collaboration, Organisation, Information literacy |
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| All - Assessment Task 3:News story | |||||||||||||||||||
| Goal: | To produce a news story for more than one media platform from a news event within 24 hours of that event occurring. |
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| Product: | Artefact - Professional, and Written Piece | ||||||||||||||||||
| Authorship Statement: | |||||||||||||||||||
| Format: | You will choose a news event in weeks 12 and complete multimedia news stories. You will write a radio script for the story and record it, including at least one grab. You will construct a multimedia social media post about the story including an original photograph or video. You will also support other class members' learning, including helping in the production of their stories. |
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| Criteria: |
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| Generic Skills: | Communication, Collaboration, Problem solving, Organisation, Applying technologies, Information literacy |
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A 12-unit course will have total of 150 learning hours which will include directed study hours (including online if required), self-directed learning and completion of assessable tasks. Student workload is calculated at 12.5 learning hours per one unit.
Please note: Course information, including specific information of recommended readings, learning activities, resources, weekly readings, etc. are available on the course Canvas site– Please log in as soon as possible.
Demonstrated basic understanding of media law; demonstrated news gathering and news writing skills across platforms; understanding and application of journalism ethics; familiarity with interviewing; familiarity with components of news production
Academic integrity is the ethical standard of university participation. It ensures that students graduate as a result of proving they are competent in their discipline. This is integral in maintaining the value of academic qualifications. Each industry has expectations and standards of the skills and knowledge within that discipline and these are reflected in assessment.
Academic integrity means that you do not engage in any activity that is considered to be academic fraud; including plagiarism, collusion or outsourcing any part of any assessment item to any other person. You are expected to be honest and ethical by completing all work yourself and indicating in your work which ideas and information were developed by you and which were taken from others. You cannot provide your assessment work to others. You are also expected to provide evidence of wide and critical reading, usually by using appropriate academic references.
In order to minimise incidents of academic fraud, this course may require that some of its assessment tasks, when submitted to Canvas, are electronically checked through Turnitin. This software allows for text comparisons to be made between your submitted assessment item and all other work to which Turnitin has access.
Eligibility for Supplementary Assessment
Your eligibility for supplementary assessment in a course is dependent of the following conditions applying:
(a) The final mark is in the percentage range 47% to 49.4%; and
(b) The course is graded using the Standard Grading scale
Your eligibility for supplementary assessment in a course is dependent of the following conditions applying: The final mark is in the percentage range 47% to 49.4% The course is graded using the Standard Grading scale You have not failed an assessment task in the course due to academic misconduct.
Late submissions may be penalised up to and including the following maximum percentage of the assessment task’s identified value, with weekdays and weekends included in the calculation of days late:
(a) One day: deduct 5%;
(b) Two days: deduct 10%;
(c) Three days: deduct 20%;
(d) Four days: deduct 40%;
(e) Five days: deduct 60%;
(f) Six days: deduct 80%;
(g) Seven days: A result of zero is awarded for the assessment task.
The following penalties will apply for a late submission for an online examination:
Less than 15 minutes: No penalty
From 15 minutes to 30 minutes: 20% penalty
More than 30 minutes: 100% penalty
For more information on Academic Learning & Teaching categories including:
For more information, visit https://www.usc.edu.au/explore/policies-and-procedures#academic-learning-and-teaching
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For course-specific questions, contact your teaching staff or Course Coordinator.
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