TheMasteryJourney

Hi there! My name is Ruqayyah and I am a current Full Sail Master's student in the New Media Journalism program. I recently graduated from Rollins College with my Bachelor's degree in Critical Media and Cultural Studies. I am extremely interested in social media and the role it plays in circulating news and informational stories to the general public and the role this will play in the development and growth of new media. I am very analytically oriented and love hearing others' ideas and perspectives. Best of luck with your mastery journey!

[themasteryjourney]

New Media Journalism - Final Project

It has been exactly 546 days or 13,104 hours since I began my journey as a New Media Journalism student. It has been 1 year, 5 months and 30 grueling days since I was a fresh faced grad student reaching for the gold of a Master’s degree. I don’t know if I’ve passed this final course (though I am sincerely hopeful that I do) and I don’t know if my thesis is close to perfection as many of those before me have created. There are a lot of unknowns. I do know, however, that this journey has been on of the most exciting, challenging, sorrowful, educational and adventurous that I have been on. I don’t regret a moment and as graduation nears in a mere 6 days, I reflect in positivity. 

This course, New Media Journalism - Final Project speaks for itself. It is the course that is dedicated to the development and publication of the final thesis document based on the capstone project published in the previous course. When I began this program, my initial thoughts about this final course were fairly generic: 

To showcase what I have learned overall about NMJ

Utilize skills from before and during the course (of study)

To create a project that fulfills all aspects of NMJ and show what I have learned 

Using the skills and information I have learned throughout my year as an NMJ student, I will be able to create the best capstone project possible

Naturally, there are a few questionable things in those statements. Firstly- at the time, I thought this final course would be the capstone project creation when in fact it is the discussion and analysis of the capstone, which was created in the course before. Secondly- it has taken me a year and a half exactly to complete this Master’s program rather than the year I thought it would take. Everything else, however, was on track for the most part. 

I did create a capstone project to showcase all of my results and I received an overwhelmingly positive response to it and legions of support regarding the subject that I covered. I also got the opportunity of a lifetime (to me, at least) to become a regular contributor to The Huffington Post! You check it out here. While that capstone project did teach me many lessons and gave me great insight into being a real life multimedia journalist, the task was perhaps less grueling than the one in this final course.

It seems after college, my brain lost all recollection of academic writing. It was so different for me to sit behind my laptop and write in an extremely formal manner and referencing materials in the stuffed fashion of formal citations. I had to take a step back and coach myself back into a manner of writing that I had done for countless years before. This opened my eyes to how important it is to hang out to skills such as academic writing because they do have the opportunity to get away and you don’t want that (baby, come back!). 

I would say that this course met my objectives fully (once I figured out halfway through the program that it would be thesis writing rather than capstone creating). It allowed me to explore the more academic side of myself and really opened my eyes to how horrible I am at in-text citations. APA style is by no means easy but for some reason, I had forgotten all of my knowledge related to APA and its in-text formats. That alone was a challenge in itself to get myself into the groove of referencing text rather than just linking to another story or article written by someone else. 

The thesis writing in general was a great exercise in reflection. I got a chance to explain where this idea about fighting Islamophobia came from and how I narrowed an international topic onto a local scale. I was also able to showcase how I got the multimedia for my story and a variety of other essential concepts. This project allowed me to hone both my writing and research skills as well as my patience, which was tested more than once with all of the technicalities of academic writing. This project allowed me to take a deeper look into the many steps of journalism and how important it is to know your material before sharing with the world. 

Overall, this course met my expectations and provided invaluable feedback from my professor, Dr. Thomas, which allowed me to improve on my thesis in order to submit something thorough, correct and professional. I appreciate all of Dr. Thomas’ experience and insight throughout this course and hope that my thesis makes him proud. 

Now, with the many lessons I have learned and the endless knowledge that I have gained, I embark on a new journey of applying what I have gained as an NMJ student to the real world. It’s time to make my mark and I thank Full Sail and my professors for providing me with such valuable information and ability. I reached for gold, ladies and gentlemen, and now -47,260,800 seconds later-, I’m right next to it. 

[themasteryjourney]

New Media Publishing

Hello, hello! Welcome to the reflection of the most hectic and challenging month of my life. This month, I was enrolled in the course New Media Publishing. This course was both daunting and exciting as it was the penultimate course in my New Media Journalism Master’s Program. In other words - HOME STRETCH. 

First and foremost, let me start off by saying how important it is as both a journalist and a human being to pay attention to details. I neglected to pay attention to the timeline for my NMJMA Capstone Project that was clearly outlined by class/due date in the instructional booklet. Needless to say, I was really expecting that my Capstone would be due in July rather than in June. It was somewhat thrust upon me when I saw that the preliminary (soft launch) was due the first week of the course. However, I am thankful for proactivity as I had completed all of the necessary elements at that point and only needed to mold it all together into a cohesive project.

Following that, I had two weeks to implement the feedback given to me by Professor Sharon and to polish my Capstone so it would be ready for the world (or my small group of website fans) to view. Unfortunately, my story became an extremely timely piece due to the tragic Pulse Nightclub shooting here in Orlando, FL. The topic was exactly relevant to the content of my Capstone project and thus, I was able to amend my project before publication to incorporate valuable information related to that event. 

By the third week of class, we had reached our final launch and all the pieces of publication, social media posting, etc., had been put into place. All that was needed was the actual push of the ‘SEND’ button, which was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. Buckets of sweat later, I received my grade which was exceptional. I couldn’t have been more thrilled. But even more so than that achievement was the speed with which my story was read and shared over and over and over. 

I attribute this particular success to my distribution plan which I spent much time thinking over. However, I also attribute this to the timeliness of the project and how important that topic is to a large population of the globe and to the open-minded thinking of those around me and those who read my posts/stories on my website. Shortly after, my story was picked up by The Huffington Post - a great honor in my opinion as I am a huge fan. I am eternally grateful to all who found my Capstone project to be important enough to be read, shared and published. 

Going back to NMP as a course, I learned much valuable information this month. When I originally had set my expected outcomes in my Mastery Timeline in Month 1, this is what I stated: 

Goal, Insight, Outcome:

To publish media on different platforms

To learn the fundamentals of journalism distribution

To best extend my work to the world

Strategy:

Observe how other companies do this and what are the best ways in order to create a publishing system 

Now, I was not incorrect. However, at the time, I was unaware that the publishing I would be doing was of my actual Capstone project. Keeping that and the above-mentioned ideas in mind, I would say that my expectations of the course were fulfilled. On the flipside, this course expected of me that I would do my best work to create and distribute my Capstone project. I believe I fulfilled all requirements related to that project and successfully fulfilled the expectations of NMP. 

Overall, this course really showed me the importance of being organized and keeping track of how you engage with the world. I stepped up my social media game this month due to the requirements and teachings in this course, which resulted in strong engagement with my Capstone project as well as my personal brand as a whole. This course taught me how valuable newsworthiness of a story is and has prepared me with tools to share important information on controversial topics with the world. 

Last but not least, I just wanted to shout out to Professor Sharon for all of the hard work and feedback he gave to his NMP class this month. Without his guidance, patience, support and constructive criticism, I would not have been able to make this story what it is. Thank you for the valuable lessons! 

And with that, we are now officially in the home stretch - third base is in the dust. Just one more crazy and enriching month of NMJMA to go. I’m excited to see the horizon, pleased that graduation looks like a reality, and I am pumped for what this final course will bring. And if I’m being honest, home stretch or not, I’m going to miss being a student of this amazing program that I have learned so much from. Cheers to NMJMA! 

[staff]

Over the weekend, Orlando saw a terrible act of violence that left many of us feeling helpless, furious, scared, numb—and resolved to take action. If you want to join us in fighting back against hatred and divisiveness through solidarity and compassion, here are some places you can turn to:

The #orlandounited tag, where Muslim and LGBTQ solidarity is being reaffirmed in the face of those who would tear it apart. 

Post it Forward, a safe space for you to share your feelings and experiences around all this, and to find other people who are sharing theirs. 

#WeAreOrlando, which is hosting fundraisers all across the country. There’s probably one near you. 

The Pulse Victims Fund. They’re working to raise as much as possible for these victims and their families, as well as distribute the fund as fast as possible. Judging by their success so far, compassion is currently walloping hatred.

Now’s the time for love. Stay safe and supportive, and let’s stand together through this.

[themasteryjourney]

Don’t let fear and hatred of mentally disturbed individuals tear us apart. Don’t let individuals who take this tragedy as an opportunity to abuse others on social media prevail. Don’t let negativity tear apart our society. Muslim, LGBTQ, Christian, Jew, Black, Arab, Caucasian... we are all humans and we are all American. #OrlandoUnited #OrlandoLove #OrlandoStrong

[themasteryjourney]

Public Relations and Reputation Management

Hello Tumblr world and other visitors! Welcome back to your monthly episode of Ruqayyah’s reflections on her New Media Journalism courses. In this month of May, I was a member of the course Public Relations and Reputation Management (PRR), led by Dr. Tom Vizcarrondo. What an exciting and informative course this was! I have always been interested in public relations and curious about what is associated with this field of study and career track. 

When I was first entering this Master’s program, I created a timeline where I listed all that I expected out of my future courses. In that timeline, I noted that my expectations of PRR were: 

To learn more about public relations and how to use that with my New Media Journalism study 

To use public relations to promote my website and increase visibility 

To make sure my stories are believable and will appeal to audiences in a strong and reputable way 

Essentially, from what I have learned in this course over the past four weeks, I was not far off in my expectations of PRR. During this month, I learned about working with public relations professionals, presenting myself as an individual and brand, maintaining a positive online reputation and writing persuasively. While I have dabbled with this in the past, this course really allowed me to expand my knowledge of an area that works alongside journalism but is very different at the same time. 

During this course, my favorite assignment was my first assignment on writing a persuasive story. This appealed to me greatly because I was writing a story for the greater good and not writing a story just because it was timely or interesting. The story that I created was promoting the purchase of This Bar Saves Lives, This product’s proceeds fund an initiative that sends one packet of nutritional food to a starving child around the world. I enjoyed writing this story because I knew that by encouraging my readers and others to purchase this product, I was helping to make a difference in the world - no matter how small.

As a new media journalist, there were definitely topics in this course that I think will benefit me greatly throughout the rest of my program and into my professional career:

Learning about PR professionals and how to deal with them was a great help to me. I learned that PR professionals and journalists often do not see eye-to-eye and also have a major trouble communicating. I can definitely use this information to help myself communicate effectively with any PR professionals that I work with. 

Learning about reputation management this month was incredibly helpful due to the fact that I was reminded how important it is to make sure and engage with my audience and show that who I am rather than just posting stories blindly. 

Overall, I do believe that all topics covered this month allowed me to increase my knowledge of journalism in a more diverse manner than before. As this course was centered mostly on public relations, it prepared me to really work and coexist with individuals from that field. PR professionals are essential to a journalist’s career because at some moments, they may bring stories to a journalist that will help both parties to build their reputations and to increase visibility and reputability of the journalist as well. In addition, PR pros can give journalists an opportunity to be the first release of information on a certain topic or event, bringing reputability to a journalist’s career. I believe the knowledge I have acquired this month will allow me to make the most out of my relationships with PR pros now and in the future as well as to improve my brand online and make it a trusted news source.  

Last but not least, I would like to take a moment to thank Dr. Vizcarrondo for being so thoughtful about pronouncing my name correctly and for his excellent guidance throughout this month in PRR. His video feedback showed me what parts of my story needed improvement or functioned well in a visible manner. This allowed me to get the most out of my assignments and to view my stories critically so that I can create written and multimedia content more effectively as a new media journalist. I appreciate the time and effort that Dr. V took to make this course excellent and enjoyable!  

I look forward to my next course in New Media Journalism and the exciting two months ahead to completing my capstone project and becoming a Master of New Media Journalism!

[themasteryjourney]

Social Media and Online Community Engagement

Hello there! It’s been almost exactly one month since I last posted on here and what an exciting and eventful month it has been. This month, in addition to being a part of the Social Media and Online Community Engagement (SME) course as part of my New Media Journalism Master’s Program at Full Sail University, I have travelled for my job for two-thirds of the month. It has been both an adventure and challenge but I was able to still learn much from this course and contribute my 100%. I am eternally grateful to Professor Foley for being patient and understanding with me.  

Now, what did I originally think this course was about? From my Mastery Journey Timeline, I was able to see the goals, insight and outcomes that I had assumed this course would be about when I first heard of it in February 2015. These are:  

•Goal, Insight, Outcome: •To use social media in the best way possible •To use community engagement skills in an online manner •To build non profits and communities via the web and multimedia platforms •Strategy: •Use past experiences of creating virtual communities to do outreach

For the most part, I was on the correct track with thinking of what I would learn in SME. This month, we dove headfirst into the world of social media. I say dove because we did not only cover the basic social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest. We were able to look at a wide variety of social media sites, some of which I’d never heard of, like SparkPeople, Digg and StumbleUpon. It was wonderful to learn about all of the different platforms and to get an idea of how many people use them, what kinds of people use them and how they reach audiences. 

Throughout this course, I was able to learn how to better draft social media posts in a way to engage followers and visitors so that they are intrigued by content and thus want to know more about a topic. This was done in a highly productive way, which was through drafting your own social media posts and receiving suggestion of improvement on them by classmates. This really helped me because my classmates are of all different ages. So while keeping in mind that they were also studying how to be strong social media users and had those skills, I also got some insight into how different individuals like different posts to sound and/or look. This gave me strong input into the styles of different journalists. 

For the most part, the above-mentioned information about learning how to use social media in the best way possible was definitely on target. I believe I was able to learn how to use social media in a very constructive and inspirational manner, which I will continue to practice throughout this program and my future career in journalism. That being said, the one aspect of this course that I misjudged was the community engagement. 

I come from a small, liberal arts college background, which is where I still work, and there - community engagement is service learning, community leadership and involvement. When I was creating my Mastery Journal Timeline, this is what I had in mind when I read ‘online community engagement’ – non-profit organizations, community service, etc.

The community engagement that this course was actually about was engaging with your community (those who follow and/or read your content) via social media. This engagement meant having an active and continuous conversation with individuals on the web that would allow me to build and promote my website and create content more specifically toward my beat. 

While I did not go into this course thinking that I would be doing that, it proved to be an incredible experience because I was able to learn something new. For me, I have always used social media for my personal use and with that, there are always people (friends and family) who are ready to automatically follow you and like your content. This way, I was able to learn about reaching out to people I do not know and getting more traffic on my website and social media sites.  

Throughout the past month, I have learned valuable skills on how to engage via social media with the vast online community. I have been able to acquire skills on posts and visual media that I was hoping for when I began this course and I was able to learn new information that I did not know before SME. Social media and multimedia are two area that I am extremely interested in this field of journalism and I believe this course was able to give me insight into how I can build my social presence and become a strong news presence. 

I am very glad for what I have learned and hope to continue learning and growing my knowledge in online community engagement and social media throughout the remainder of my New Media Journalism program and beyond. I am looking forward to the month of May! 

[themasteryjourney]

Multimedia Reporting

Hello again! It’s been a little while since you all here on Tumblr have heard from me - just about two months to be exact. I have been absent from academic since January due to my grandmother’s passing. A time in which I tried to work through this course but was unable to and thus here I am in March, finally completing this course. 

This course has been very much what I expected it would be and more. When I created my Mastery Journey Timeline in my first course last February, this is what I thought Multimedia Reporting would be all about: 

•Goal, Insight, Outcome: •To learn how to report via multimedia •Multimedia will have a different style than verbal or written reporting •To tell stories through many different ways •Strategy: •I will research the ways in which multimedia has been used to report information 

In a sense I was right because I was taught how to create content in ways different that verbal or written content. I learned how important and effective it is to include multiple forms of multimedia into a story - whether that be audio, video, infographic, photos and text. These add an extra element to a story which really allows the reader to engage in multiple ways or their favorite way. 

One thing I will mention about my learnings this month is about text. Text is highly underestimated. I have always considered text to be my strong suit because I have loved writing for many years. I thought that when I came to Multimedia Reporting, I would have to lessen my love of text and embrace more audio-visual forms. However, when I looked at my first assignment, I noticed that Dr. Thomas had included text as a multimedia element. I immediately became very excited because this form of communication is one of my favorites. I realized then that there is power in text and while at first it may seem lesser than audio, visual or creative components- it is not. Text allows us to put context to our other multimedia elements and to make a story succinct and cohesive. I was able to appreciate this element even more than I had before. 

This course truly met my goals as it allowed to expand on my knowledge of multimedia in general. In all honestly, in some past courses, the lessons for the week have no been particularly engaging. In this course, however, I was able to do all of the lessons because they were very visually engaging and easy to understand. I learned oodles (yes, oodles) more than I have learned in many of my other courses thus far. That reinforced my objective of learning how to create solid multimedia stories because I saw how positive the effect of creating content in that style is - from my own personal experience.

I know that for both my course writing as I get into these final four months of New Media Journalism and in my personal writings and freelancing that I will definitely incorporate multimedia elements into all of my stories. This really diversifies journalism and has brought me into the light of more dynamic audience engagement. 

I truly believe this course has helped me to become a better journalist and I look forward to using the skills I have gained here in my upcoming courses and in my career as a multimedia and new media journalist moving forward. Thank you, Dr. Thomas! 

[themasteryjourney]

Digital News Production

This month I was enrolled for the second time in the course Digital News Production. Second time because I was unable to finish this course last month due to personal health issues. This time around, I have made it to the end of this course - hopefully with success. 

When I looked at this course outline when I was in Mastery: PDL, I had the following expectations and goals set out for my participation in this course-- 

Goal, Insight, Outcome: •To know how newsroom functions •Previous experience with reporting verbally and with digital media would help •To know the ins and outs of putting media content onto the screen 

Strategy: •I will use my verbal and digital skills to create projects worthy of being in digital online and visual media and in newsrooms  

Once I was enrolled in this course and I had a chance to read the syllabus and the outlines, I realized that my earlier goals/insights/expectations were mostly on the right path. I realized that not only would I learn how to put media on the screen but that I would get a step-by-step refresher of documentary style journalism. For my capstone thesis project in my undergraduate career, I shot and created a 15-minute documentary video which took all of four months to make and still, was not 100% exactly what I wanted. However, I was able to take those skills I had from before (interviewing, angles, creative shots, sound, b-roll, etc) and develop them in this course. I was able to hone them into better versions of what they were when I was a younger student. 

I expected the course to give me more skills in the area of video journalism, interviews and creative compilation of the various aspects of video. I believe the course definitely assisted me in this area. The course expected of me that I would perform my best, learn the various ways to shoot b-roll, audio, interviews, and mesh all of these aspects together to tell newsworthy and visually/audibly appealing stories. I believe that I did not put my best foot forward in this class due to unexpected family circumstances. I was distracted through the latter half of the course which restrained me from my full potential. However, I did try to the best of my ability that I was capable of and I learned (based on feedback from Professor Sharon and grades) that I was able to pull through even in adversity which gives me encouragement for the future. 

I truly believe all of the content in this course was most helpful to my learning experience. In particular, the professor himself was an asset to me as being able to bounce ideas of of him and have his support made me a stronger student. Overall, I thought the course was very well organized and provided me with MANY supplements that I could reference, watch and learn from before I began my various projects. I believe this course has been most helpful in preparing me for my career in journalism because I realize that I love working with video and this course honed that love and those skills throughout the month. I hope that I will be able to continue to build on these skills and this knowledge and that I will become a strong journalist in the near future. 

[themasteryjourney]

Multimedia Development and Editing

When I created my Mastery Journey Timeline in my very first class as a part of the New Media Journalism Master’s Program at Full Sail, I had several expectations of what I would learn in the course. These were: ‘to have better skills with multimedia communications,’ ‘developing my visual skills that I had before which will allow me to progress faster,’ and ‘to better edit and use multimedia platforms.’ In addition, I stated my strategy for succeeding in this course as: ‘I will utilize the skills I already have and develop them for specific multimedia use.’ I believe these expectations to be truthful of when I started this class of Multimedia Development and Editing. 

The expectations that were set for this course included developing story ideas, visualizing elements of journalism such as photojournalism and audio, increasing skills with editing software, improving writing and online presence. I definitely think these expectations were achievable and that they allowed me to see different aspects of multimedia journalism in a different light. I was able to hone my skills, to the best of my current ability, with audio and imagery. I had edited audio and video at length before but had never worked as much with images which I believe I still need to work on. I thought all of the content was helpful during this experience as I am now able to understand basic ins and outs of multiple platforms for journalism. I think perhaps the most helpful were the tutorials in how to use the software and the detailed assignment about website development, which was something I had never done before. 

I believe this course prepared me for my career better because of my interest in multimedia platforms. I have established a strong repertoire with hand writing and paper journalism through my undergraduate career and my certifications as a writer. However, this course re-introduced concepts to me of editing and developing audio and video and completely introduced new aspects such as photo essays and multimedia stories. I believe I am more prepared now because I understand these different types of reporting and can better aid my written stories with visual and audio elements. 

Overall, I began this course with excitement about the skills I would learn and the audio/visual experience I would gain from the assignments and theoretical learning of this topic. After four busy weeks, I am no less excited despite having overcome many hindrances to get this far in Multimedia Development and Editing. This course became very difficult for me following a nearly devastating accident that almost completely barred me from physical motion. Despite this, I did not want to give up on this class as it is very important for me to move forward with my studies. Professor Sharon graciously worked patiently with me so that I had a fair chance at completing the assignments and receiving credit for them. I believe I have not been able to do my best work with the assignments in this course due to this which is frustrating considering that I have a passion for multimedia production and have much practice with it. However, I believe that I have tried to the best of my ability to accomplish these assignments and never would have been able to move forward without the assistance of Professor Sharon for which I am forever grateful. I sincerely appreciate all that I have learned in this class and cannot wait for the opportunity to apply these skills to future projects. 

[positivelifetips]

Don’t you ever give up on you dreams, your goals, your wants. And don’t you dare give up on YOU!

Little by little and you will get to where you want to be.

It’s your life, MAKEITEPIC! -Jhon LeBaron

[themasteryjourney]

RIS: Research & Investigation Skills.

Hello again friends, 

Welcome to Mastery Journal once again. I am your host, Ruqayyah and it is a pleasure to be with you again. Today, we’re reflecting on the class that I repeated this month called Research & Investigation Skills at Full Sail University with Professor Christy Foley. I’m not sure how well I will do with this post as I believe a reflection is meant to have you think about the positives and negatives, ups and downs of a course or a situation rather than a filling-in of links as is requested. While I will include information for you to ‘open in new tab (or window),’ I also want to take a moment to holistically look at the course itself. When I began this course two months ago, I had already set together several expectations from my first course in the New Media Journalism Master’s Program. These goals are as follows: 

-To establish strong research skills

-Exploring how research is conducted for media in order to gather the ethics and methods used in past

-To be a better and more effective researcher for New Media Journalism

These goals were made with the expectation that I would turn myself into a better, more detailed, more astute researcher in order to make the best of my investigations as a new media journalist. 

Do I think I have succeeded? 

Yes. I actually think I have. When I originally took this class, I tried my hardest and put in 100% of my effort but somehow it was not fruitful and I felt like a failure and definitely a bad researcher. This month, I buckled down even harder and paid more attention to detail in both the assignment instructions and in my actual investigations and writings throughout the course. 

I was able to explore how research is conducted and was able to work my own style around that in order to stay within the boundaries of all the requirements while still gathering valid information. I believe I am much stronger in this area that I know I was previously lacking in and have developed more effective methods around my research that I did not have before. 

I acquired the knowledge of how to research public records from various sites such as USA.gov, the White House Archives, the National Archives and Records Administration among other websites pertaining to government. In addition, I learned different types of interviewing styles that helped me to hone my own and to learn more about how I want to collect information from those who I speak to. I was able to discern that I have a talkative personality and through this can make others at ease in order to share with me the information that they have. Last but not least, I acquired patience which I have very little of. I was able to relax myself into researching for hours and collecting information on things and people or tracking down people for interviews. This learned patience helped me to see the benefit of research and appreciate my outcomes much more than I have in past. 

In addition, I believe I was timely, professional and original in all of my work and was able to supply the professor with new and valid information about stories pertaining to the beat of my website: culture, travel, international affairs. And more importantly, the professor showed me encouragement this month which I am grateful for. I came into this repeat class with a bleak outlook and a determination to try and better what I did last month and I believe with this support, I was able to be a much stronger student this month. Many thanks for that. 

Overall, I am glad I had the chance to take this course again and ‘write’ my wrongs. I believe I have become a stronger researcher and have the ability to carry over the skills I have learned here to my future classes in this program in order to be the best student and new media journalist that I can be. 

[themasteryjourney]

Research and Investigation Skills

Well well well. Here we are again, friends, with another post about another class on this long and enlightening (this month, grueling) course of study for New Media Journalism. At the beginning of this Master’s program, I had to make a mastery journey timeline (hence the lovely posts you get from my each month). For this particular class.... 

My original goals:  

•To establish strong research skills •Exploring how research is conducted for media in order to gather the ethics and methods used in past •To be a better and more efficient researcher on and for new media journalism

My original strategy: 

•I will use the research strategies taught in this course to better narrow down what I am looking for to be a more effective media researcher

So what did I learn from what I thought this class was about and what it really was about? First, I had one thing confirmed - research is difficult and not for the busy or the faint of heart. This class took up way more time than any of my past courses simply because so much was required and the assignments were less interesting than my past classes have been.

Of course, that brings a challenge -- so what parts of the course met with my original goals and strategy and/or negated them? I did learn research skills - I looked into interview styles, I learned how to look up public records and I learned the importance of infographics. I must say I did enjoy the first section on infographics because I am a visual learner and have had experience with creating graphics before. It is my hope to continue to expand my learning of creating infographics and presenting information creatively. 

With the interview skills, that was great insight into how others do things and what interviews could look like. My only qualm is that when I did my own interview and created my final story... I found out that my style choice did not meet requirements. So why bother to have us look into different interview styles if our eventual style choice will not be respected? Either way, it was a pleasure interviewing the woman who contributed to my article. I have a love of travel and my memories and knowledge of travel and study abroad combined with what my interviewee and I discussed was definitely a positive part of this course. 

Overall the course did teach me different ways to research including public records, people and information. It was a benefit as I have lots of tutorials to rely on now to remind me how to find certain things. I don’t think my original strategy of using the information gleaned from this course will allow me to be a better media researcher, however, I do think that the information from this course has put me on the road to becoming a better media researcher and I can definitely use the tools learned here as a base in order to build my own research and investigation skills for the future. I look forward to the next class and my chance to work even harder and better than in past. Best of luck to my fellow students!

[themasteryjourney]

Legal Aspects of Media

Hi friends! Welcome back to Mastery Journal with Ruqayyah. Every month I’m required to post to this page as to what I learned from the class of the month. This lovely flowery month of May -just kidding, this is florida so it’s hot and everything is burnt already-.... I became acquainted with the class Legal Aspects of Media. This was definitely an interesting topic for me as I have rarely covered legal aspects in my undergraduate and general studies but it is something that interests me. 

My first impression was WHOA. So much reading compared to the previous classes I have had in this master’s program. It was both refreshing and challenging at the same time. More challenging because I have become even more visual as the reading lessened and hands-on greatened as I have ascended through the levels of higher education. It took quite a while to get through the legal documents and what not pertaining to different things throughout the course such as: defamation, copyright, deceptive advertising and so on and so forth. Those are just a few covered but there is a wealth of information concerning these legal topics pertaining to media that really interested me and I will continue to explore them even after this class. 

These subjects all held different interest for me and I think my favorite assignment in this course was the copyright assignment. That is something that we encounter on a daily basis and has a lot to do with social media which interests me. The part of the assignment itself that I liked, however, was discovering that there is database where you can discover the copyrights to almost every material creation of this age. So very cool! I also think, for me, copyright will be most important to me as I am not quite sure at this point where my career is leading me and exactly what line of work I will end up after this (in media, of course/hopefully). Thus I think copyright applies to writing in particular and I have a special interest in how it affects social media which I am hoping to work closely with in my career path as a communications professional. 

I definitely think this class was valuable to my study of New Media Journalism as many of the legal aspects we studied were new information to me and have prepared me better. I will make better choices as a communications professional knowing what I know from this class and will be able to, hopefully, keep any legal risks at bay by having this knowledge. I think this course allowed me to learn a lot and I gained practical information for my use, such as searching copyrights, in addition to reading about the various information in articles and documents. The knowledge acquired has been two fold and I enjoyed working with the instructor once again. 

Looking forward to the new month! 

[themasteryjourney]

Writing for Interactive Media

Well, hello there. Today is my final post for the Writing for Interactive Media course. It has been the third course in my journey toward achieving my Master’s in New Media Journalism and I must say I enjoyed it immensely. Writing is a personal passion of mine and I enjoyed doing more written and research work of live events rather than previously working with setting up websites and whatnot. It is simply a preference. Everything I have learned thus far, even if it is not necessarily a passion of mine, has been most rewarding. 

This month, however, was most important to me thus far because I enjoyed the work so much. I particularly enjoyed covering live events such as an Orlando City game and evaluating articles written as profiles and live coverage and seeing what my peers interests and perspectives are on topics like this.

I think what I learned most from this particular class was not simply what journalistic writing looks like and how to improve on that to create a better version of my writing but what the writing on others purveys. I was able to read all of my classmates posts every week and get a feeling for the different voices and ways that different people tell various stories. Some were more storytellers while others fact staters and others very eloquent with their wording. To me this helped me to understand how important personal voice is in journalistic writing. Not opining but just having your own personal touch added into the piece you are putting so much effort into. 

This class definitely allowed me to grow and develop an incredibly important skill to the field of my interest. I loved the way the professor (thank you, Ms. Cochie!) was able to provide us with forms to evaluate articles before we jumped in and wrote them ourselves. I also enjoyed and appreciated the feedback given from Ms. Cochie as I believe it helped me to reevaluate my writing and build on that even more. Overall, this class helped me to see the future of what my writing will be for my master’s program and how to develop it even further. 

[themasteryjourney]

New Media Communications

Howdy! Today’s post is a wonderful little reflection on my current class New Media Communications. This has been my first official course related to new media journalism since I have become a student at Full Sail. Earlier on in the program, during my last class which was about mastery and personal development... we were required to create a timeline for ourselves that would guide us along especially in consideration with what we thought and wanted to learn from our upcoming classes. Last month, for New Media Communications and what I understood it to be, I wrote: Goal, Insight, Outcome:   - Familiarize myself with the varying multimedia platforms   - Knowing what these are and how they work will allow me to best research and report the stories I write and create   - This will allow me to most efficiently use the platforms that I will use in my career in order to be prepared    

Strategy: 

  - I will closely study the ways that new media platforms work in order to better understand the mediums through which I will show my work in my career

Clearly, my last month self though NMC was going to prepare me with an overview of all the media platforms that I would be using as a New Media Journalism student. I was not wrong. During this course, I learned how to set up and create a website, what domains are, what web hosting is (and how to get it for cheap) and brushed up on my social media website skills with Twitter and Facebook. I also developed my own personal brand and what I would write about: a little world called Ruqayyah’s World Press or R. World Press where I will write stories and posts about travel and culture.

So did I think right about this class? I believe so. I wanted and thought I was going to gain knowledge of working different platforms through which to showcase my work. I believe I have gained this experience through this class as well as first-time, valuable knowledge on how to work on a website which was completely new to me. It’s nice to know that I have gained the basics of yet another skill and that I will be able to apply the hands-on work that I have done to my career with New Media Journalism as I now feel much more secure in website publishing and social media.  Also, just a note about my professor who provided us with worksheets to organize our thoughts as we went through the steps of building our website and social media presence. Those worksheets were genius because they really helped me to focus and organize my ideas and narrow down what I was doing much better than if I had been brainstorming in general -- thank you!  I learned so much from this class about platforms and I am excited for the next class to learn about Writing for Interactive Media and being able to develop the stories that I have started in NMC. 

[themasteryjourney]

The Beginning is the End, the End the Beginning.

Alas the Master Journey has just begun.... and here are the steps toward it! 

http://prezi.com/rujiilhrma-c/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy&rc=ex0share

[thepositivetumbler]

[themasteryjourney]

Logo of my life. #masteryjourney

For me... a logo is something representative of yourself that shows the world what they might expect or what the personality of the individual is. This logo is classic and simple with the shadowing in my favorite shade of blue, being a reflection of the simple but classic vibe that I believe I have.