It glows, but not with pure light.
It's more a half-light, merely hinted at by the beams that sneak through the plastic sheath that adorns it. It can't be fairly called white – that would be an insult to the color – nor quite yellow, as its brightness is questionable at best. It's sort of an indescribable shade between the two, and it emanates from long, fluorescent tubes whose outlines are only visible behind the thick plastic thanks to the photons they're emitting.
No, the lights in this classroom aren't the most brilliant on the planet, but they get the job done.
And right now, they're working overtime.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Mr. Lambersie mini-profile
There's a dinosaur in the New York Museum of Natural History called a lambeosaurus.
Mr. Lambersie – Lambo, for short – probably didn't discover it, but Ali Martin still emailed him after she saw it just to make sure. Given Lambo's multitude of interests, it isn't at all unlikely that he might have had a stint as an archaeologist and dug up a pile of bones that no one had seen before.
"He was learning with us," Martin said of Lambo's role as coach of the academic decathlon team at Crown Point High School in Crown Point, Ind. "Whether it was history or English or art he was really dedicated to learning it."
In title, though, Lambo is an English teacher. Martin met him during her junior year of high school when he taught her AP Literature class. That class, she says, set her on her life course.
"I credit him as the person who gave me the initiative to start writing seriously," she said.
Lambo's pedigree as a phenomenal English teacher isn't the lone trait that made him so influential on Martin's life, though. He's also "an absolute asshole" who is "so funny" and "hilarious."
As much of those revelations came from Martin's time in his class as it did from spending two hours after school with him twice a week as a part of the academic decathlon team. It was there that the two were able to forge even deeper bonds.
Still, his presence in that AP Literature classroom junior year, the hilarious asshole that he is, made his biggest mark on Martin's life.
"If I ever write a novel, I plan to dedicate it to him," she said.
Mr. Lambersie – Lambo, for short – probably didn't discover it, but Ali Martin still emailed him after she saw it just to make sure. Given Lambo's multitude of interests, it isn't at all unlikely that he might have had a stint as an archaeologist and dug up a pile of bones that no one had seen before.
"He was learning with us," Martin said of Lambo's role as coach of the academic decathlon team at Crown Point High School in Crown Point, Ind. "Whether it was history or English or art he was really dedicated to learning it."
In title, though, Lambo is an English teacher. Martin met him during her junior year of high school when he taught her AP Literature class. That class, she says, set her on her life course.
"I credit him as the person who gave me the initiative to start writing seriously," she said.
Lambo's pedigree as a phenomenal English teacher isn't the lone trait that made him so influential on Martin's life, though. He's also "an absolute asshole" who is "so funny" and "hilarious."
As much of those revelations came from Martin's time in his class as it did from spending two hours after school with him twice a week as a part of the academic decathlon team. It was there that the two were able to forge even deeper bonds.
Still, his presence in that AP Literature classroom junior year, the hilarious asshole that he is, made his biggest mark on Martin's life.
"If I ever write a novel, I plan to dedicate it to him," she said.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Sidney Crosby profile
I'm a huge sports fan, but I've often sat on the fence about whether I'd like to become a sportswriter because my allegiance to my favorite teams is too great. I couldn't be like Mike Wilbon, who loves his Bears but can speak with great admiration for Aaron Rodgers, or Bill Simmons who concedes that Magic Johnson was better than Larry Bird despite his lifelong love affair with all things Boston. I'm concerned, I guess, that my writing might come off a bit too much like Sean Conboy's, the author of "Don't Trust Sidney Crosby With Your Car Keys" from Pittsburgh Magazine. I'm gonna go out on a limb and assume this guy doesn't think too highly of Alex Ovechkin, but I could be wrong.
That's not to say there's necessarily anything wrong with biased sports journalism. I read a Spurs blog, a Bengals blog and a Reds blog every single morning when I wake up, and none of those blogs' authors are remotely objective about the teams they cover. But when you're writing a profile piece like Conboy's, there might be at least some obligation to be even-handed. Our author feels no such responsibility.
Don't get me wrong; I like Sidney Crosby. I think he's probably the best player in the NHL today – although as a Blue Jackets fan I'd give anything for Rick Nash to be better. I just didn't find this article to be anything that needed written. I guess I felt the same way about the Megan Fox article we read during the first week. Is there some new, interesting insight on Sidney Crosby in the piece? No, we pretty much learn that he's really nice, really hardworking, and really good at hockey. Well, no shit. But wait – he's kind of a prankster! Uh, he plays professional sports. Why are you telling me this?
I guess if I was a huge Penguins fan this would be an awesome article. But I'm not. From a style perspective, it's decent, but never once is it gripping. The lead and kicker are both about as manufactured as it comes. "Whoa, this guy is a paradox, check out these opposite-sounding things that he is both of!" and "Ha, ha. Watch me quote the title of my own article!" both come off about as sincere and interesting as the liberal use of puns. This is a fluff piece written for a Pittsburgh audience that will eat it up, and no one aside from Penguins fans and people told they needed to read it for a class likely read the entire thing. Or am I somehow bitter? Go Jackets!
That's not to say there's necessarily anything wrong with biased sports journalism. I read a Spurs blog, a Bengals blog and a Reds blog every single morning when I wake up, and none of those blogs' authors are remotely objective about the teams they cover. But when you're writing a profile piece like Conboy's, there might be at least some obligation to be even-handed. Our author feels no such responsibility.
Don't get me wrong; I like Sidney Crosby. I think he's probably the best player in the NHL today – although as a Blue Jackets fan I'd give anything for Rick Nash to be better. I just didn't find this article to be anything that needed written. I guess I felt the same way about the Megan Fox article we read during the first week. Is there some new, interesting insight on Sidney Crosby in the piece? No, we pretty much learn that he's really nice, really hardworking, and really good at hockey. Well, no shit. But wait – he's kind of a prankster! Uh, he plays professional sports. Why are you telling me this?
I guess if I was a huge Penguins fan this would be an awesome article. But I'm not. From a style perspective, it's decent, but never once is it gripping. The lead and kicker are both about as manufactured as it comes. "Whoa, this guy is a paradox, check out these opposite-sounding things that he is both of!" and "Ha, ha. Watch me quote the title of my own article!" both come off about as sincere and interesting as the liberal use of puns. This is a fluff piece written for a Pittsburgh audience that will eat it up, and no one aside from Penguins fans and people told they needed to read it for a class likely read the entire thing. Or am I somehow bitter? Go Jackets!
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Medical Marijuana response
I guess I'm not entirely sure what the Time article we read for today's (canceled) class, "Medical-Marijuana Schools Grow New Industry in Michigan," was supposed to teach us. The story was definitely the most newsy thing we've read in the semester thus far, and it was certainly competent, but it failed to grab my attention. An unaccredited college that teaches kids how to grow pot could be fodder for a really juicy, interesting feature piece, but the only thought that I walked away from this article with was "Oh, that's something that exists. Huh."
From a style perspective, there's not a ton to talk about, but the journalism is quite solid. There's lots of good quotes and sources, and some of the anecdotes – like the 52-year-old student whose stash and grow lamps were stolen – were pretty interesting. I suppose this was meant to be an example of extending a news story to magazine length and adding a little bit of the analysis that a magazine can offer. Its relative objectivity was comparable to that of "The Girl Who Conned the Ivy League," but the story wasn't nearly as inherently interesting.
Furthermore, the content of the story is a little bit eye-roll-worthy, in my opinion. A whole bunch of dudes rented space across the street from a KFC to grow weed and are calling it a college? It's great that people who need medical marijuana in Michigan are able to obtain it, but this kind of seems like glorifying pot subculture and trying to put a stamp of officialdom on it, and nothing drives me up the wall quite like that. It's like if NORML could give out fake diplomas. I realize this is ancillary to the point, but it certainly didn't help my thoughts on the article.
I thought the journalism work done for this article was pretty good, but at the end of the day, I just wasn't that high on the total package. Huh-huh. I said high.
From a style perspective, there's not a ton to talk about, but the journalism is quite solid. There's lots of good quotes and sources, and some of the anecdotes – like the 52-year-old student whose stash and grow lamps were stolen – were pretty interesting. I suppose this was meant to be an example of extending a news story to magazine length and adding a little bit of the analysis that a magazine can offer. Its relative objectivity was comparable to that of "The Girl Who Conned the Ivy League," but the story wasn't nearly as inherently interesting.
Furthermore, the content of the story is a little bit eye-roll-worthy, in my opinion. A whole bunch of dudes rented space across the street from a KFC to grow weed and are calling it a college? It's great that people who need medical marijuana in Michigan are able to obtain it, but this kind of seems like glorifying pot subculture and trying to put a stamp of officialdom on it, and nothing drives me up the wall quite like that. It's like if NORML could give out fake diplomas. I realize this is ancillary to the point, but it certainly didn't help my thoughts on the article.
I thought the journalism work done for this article was pretty good, but at the end of the day, I just wasn't that high on the total package. Huh-huh. I said high.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Story outline
-Lead, describing some aspect of my subject's (Jackie Matava) first scene onstage in Faust
-Transition into "where it all began" – spend some time on her childhood
-Fast forward to high school/college applications, shifting focus
-Spend some time on her undergrad at Vassar
-Spend a good deal of time on her semester in England, where she (finally) had the revelation that she wanted to sing for a living
-Grad school application process
-Her time at IU thus far
-Kicker back at the opera, presumably with closing scene
**Also going to try to intersperse scenes from the opera into the narrative of the story, hopefully going so far as to hint at parallels between Jackie and her character. Need to see the opera first.
-Transition into "where it all began" – spend some time on her childhood
-Fast forward to high school/college applications, shifting focus
-Spend some time on her undergrad at Vassar
-Spend a good deal of time on her semester in England, where she (finally) had the revelation that she wanted to sing for a living
-Grad school application process
-Her time at IU thus far
-Kicker back at the opera, presumably with closing scene
**Also going to try to intersperse scenes from the opera into the narrative of the story, hopefully going so far as to hint at parallels between Jackie and her character. Need to see the opera first.
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Interview questions
I kind of envision my interviews for my profile to be free-flowing conversations that lend insight on the character who I'm profiling. However, here's a few of the questions I hope to walk away with decent answers to:
-How did you get involved in opera? Was it parental pressure, or did you take enough of a liking to it independently to want to do it for your life?
-When you were an undergrad what level of participation were you able to have in performances?
-What is it about opera that makes you love it enough to center your life around it?
- What's the daily routine of someone in graduate school for opera?
-What is your favorite aria/character, and what part would you most like to sing someday in your career? (generic questions like this can get people talking, anyway)
-What's the relationship of a singer in an opera to the musicians, the director, the conductor, and everyone else involved in the huge production?
-Why IU?
-How do you balance performing in operas with the coursework inherent in graduate school?
There will undoubtedly be more, but some of it will come right out of the conversation. I'm hoping to get more about her childhood, since deciding to be an opera singer seems like a weird thing for anyone under about 18 to do. I'm also going to try to play up some of the "high pressure life" angles, and hopefully she'll be receptive. I've sort of got to let the story breathe and let her guide me, but I think this is a good starting point.
-How did you get involved in opera? Was it parental pressure, or did you take enough of a liking to it independently to want to do it for your life?
-When you were an undergrad what level of participation were you able to have in performances?
-What is it about opera that makes you love it enough to center your life around it?
- What's the daily routine of someone in graduate school for opera?
-What is your favorite aria/character, and what part would you most like to sing someday in your career? (generic questions like this can get people talking, anyway)
-What's the relationship of a singer in an opera to the musicians, the director, the conductor, and everyone else involved in the huge production?
-Why IU?
-How do you balance performing in operas with the coursework inherent in graduate school?
There will undoubtedly be more, but some of it will come right out of the conversation. I'm hoping to get more about her childhood, since deciding to be an opera singer seems like a weird thing for anyone under about 18 to do. I'm also going to try to play up some of the "high pressure life" angles, and hopefully she'll be receptive. I've sort of got to let the story breathe and let her guide me, but I think this is a good starting point.
Mister Rogers profile response
It's tough to put into words how good the Mister Rogers profile we read for class really was. It's difficult to imagine a better magazine article than this one. It takes Mister Rogers, a symbol of the simple and uncomplicated and beloved, and fleshes him out more fully while doing nothing to dispel the idea of his simplicity. He's as great a person as we all imagined he is, but not necessarily any more complicated. He does the same thing every day, he loves everyone, he prays for everyone, he asks for prayers, and he's generally just one of the best people ever, if this profile is to be believed.
Structurally, the article was definitely the most modernist, stylized piece we've read. It's almost stream-of-consciousness at times, and there's a handful of brief vignettes about people whose lives were touched by Mister Rogers in some way interspersed throughout the article at seemingly random times. They aren't random, though. They're crucial to the story, and they serve only to flesh it out and make it a better piece. All of them brilliantly show another side of Mister Rogers' seemingly endless kindness and generosity, and they make his story more complete.
I thought the lead was pretty interesting. The writer doesn't insert himself into the story as a character so much, but he decided to lead with a memory from his own childhood in an article figuring heavily on childhood and memory. We don't get introduced to Mister Rogers until after the first formal break in the story. The lead reads a bit like a vague, half-remembered fever dream, but to the writer, it's special, and that's what the entire article means to communicate: what's special to different people, and how Mister Rogers is tied so indelibly to so many of those people.
Still, it's not an overly effusive, panegyric article. It's real, it just happens that the real Mister Rogers is a great person.
Structurally, the article was definitely the most modernist, stylized piece we've read. It's almost stream-of-consciousness at times, and there's a handful of brief vignettes about people whose lives were touched by Mister Rogers in some way interspersed throughout the article at seemingly random times. They aren't random, though. They're crucial to the story, and they serve only to flesh it out and make it a better piece. All of them brilliantly show another side of Mister Rogers' seemingly endless kindness and generosity, and they make his story more complete.
I thought the lead was pretty interesting. The writer doesn't insert himself into the story as a character so much, but he decided to lead with a memory from his own childhood in an article figuring heavily on childhood and memory. We don't get introduced to Mister Rogers until after the first formal break in the story. The lead reads a bit like a vague, half-remembered fever dream, but to the writer, it's special, and that's what the entire article means to communicate: what's special to different people, and how Mister Rogers is tied so indelibly to so many of those people.
Still, it's not an overly effusive, panegyric article. It's real, it just happens that the real Mister Rogers is a great person.
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