#utned

[engagedutjournalism-blog]

Thanks!

This concludes our coverage of News Engagement Day 2016.  We learned a lot about how the public gets their news, what they know about current events and why they believe news is important. Although News Engagement Day is a chance for y’all to engage with the news, it’s also a chance for us to engage with y’all! Professor McElroy’s Reporting Words class would like to extend our thanks for your participation and support. We hope you learned a little more about what’s going on in the world and enjoyed our photos, videos and more! 

—Claire Allbright

[engagedutjournalism-blog]

UT Student News Engagement

(Cont’d) Our social media team gave out two surveys to gauge news engagement, and here are the results from UT students! We had 43 respondents.

85 percent of students use either Facebook or Twitter most for their news. 

It seems that students don’t have a set schedule for browsing the news, as nearly half reported they do so sporadically, and the morning and evening browsers were evenly split. 

Finally, nearly half of UT students polled reported that 9/11 was the first major news event they remember living through. Hurricane Katrina came in second followed by the presidential elections of 2004 and 2008. What do you think student’s responses will be to that question will be 10 years from now?

[engagedutjournalism-blog]

What does news mean to you?

"News is keeping up with what's new, important and affecting the world in which we live." —Diana Dawson, Director of Moody College Writing Support Program 

[engagedutjournalism-blog]

UT Student News Engagement

Our social media team gave out two surveys to gauge news engagement, and here are the results from UT students! We had 43 respondents. 

Only six students said they were “extremely engaged” with news, while about 80 percent of the sample considered themselves “very” or “slightly” engaged. Compared to the average 29 percent of millenials who are “newsless,” only 7 percent of our respondents reported they were not engaged at all. 

More than 40 percent of UT students said that they were most aware of political news -- would that number be different if it weren’t a presidential election year? 

One thing’s for sure among students: digital is key! Approximately 83 percent of respondents said they liked to get their news digitally either online or through social media or apps. 

More results from the quiz are on their way soon!

[engagedutjournalism-blog]

For me, news is the first report of history.

John “J.B.” Bird, Director of Media Relations and Digital Newsroom Editor, UT Office of the President

[engagedutjournalism-blog]

Why is news important to you and what is the first major news event you remember?

“I love news! My parents had home delivery of the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and our local paper every day so reading the newspaper, including the comics, was an important part of my morning routine, even as a young child. The biggest news events from my childhood that I clearly remember are the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion and the murder of John Lennon.” — Jay Bernhardt, Dean of the Moody College of Communication  

[engagedutjournalism-blog]

What is the first major news event that you remember?

“I have a very vivid memory of it at age six, in first grade, of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and I remember it was early afternoon after lunch and my first-grade teacher came into the class crying and said the president had been shot. This was before cable news, so there were three major news networks, CBS, NBC and ABC. The school was dismissed and I went home and my mother was crying and had CBS news on TV. I remember very vividly watching the coverage of the assassination as a 6-year-old.” —Gregory Fenves, President of the University of Texas at Austin

[engagedutjournalism-blog]

Non-UT Student News Consumption

Since today is National News Engagement Day, our social media team was interested to see how the average, non-UT student consumes news. We created a survey to answer our questions on how the average person views news.

Our largest demographic of survey takers was the 18-24 age range at 55.38 percent. The second largest was the 30+ age range at 38.46 percent. This holds true to actual demography since there are more millennials than baby-boomers.

When traditional forms of media were commonplace, most people received news in the morning and evening. Now that were are able to be connected at all times of the day, news tends to be more sporadic, and no longer do consumers have to wait on the morning news to see what has happened. Our survey takers rated “sporadically/when you receive alerts” as the most common time they browse the news. Morning was rated the second most common time and evening third.

Keep watching this blog for more results!