Tuesday, August 24

Back 2 School, TCL, PCN, & the Sinclair Kool-Aid

It was back to class this week for me...a doctoral seminar in rhetoric and philsophy of journalism at Duquesne University. That's where I'll be late Monday afternoons and early evenings for the next 15 weeks. Duquense will have a two-week head start on Westminster and Pitt when it comes to the semester. I'm attempting to attain approval to transfer the credit from this seminar to my program at Pitt in the School of Ed's English/Communications program.

My daughter Tess starts first grade this week. Meanwhile Emma will begin her school on August 30, the same day we begin classes at Westminster.

On Friday we welcome some 380 new students to Westminster with the opening convocation. And Dr. Barner has asked that we provide local newscasts on the radio on weekday mornings at 7, 8 and 9. We will comply. The staffing and production of those newscasts will be the duty of the BC 120-B (News) practicum this semester.


The first County Line television broadcast is set for September 16th.


The live telecast on WCN of the Lawrence County Band Festival is slated for Wednesday, September 15.


Meanwhile, Chuck Chirozzi has informed me that the
Pennsylvania Cable Network (PCN) is picking up one of our Friday night high school football games-- Sharon vs. Hickory (in Hermitage) which will air live on WCN on Friday, September 10 with PCN running it on Saturday, September 11 at 9 PM.

The Post-Gazette featured a column last week describing WPGH-TV's newly appointed news manager as having
"clearly tasted of the Sinclair Kool-Aid and doesn't mind the flavor."

The paper's interview with Jeff Alan has him championing Sinclair's News Central approach to outsourcing local news and weather to corporate headquarters outside of Baltimore where it gets a fresh coat of the conservative paint like the kind Fox News likes to use. What's ironic is the fact that here's a guy supporting this trend to outsource local news and blatently brand it with the corporation's conservative politics and agenda but it conflicts with the message of responsibie journalism which is also the title of Alan's book about journalism ethics book which is marketed as a resource for college students learning how to become credible journalists.

Meanwhile the ratings for Fox 53's 10 o'clock news are down. Could it mean the audience has also tasted the Sinclair Kool-Aid and isn't coming back for more?