Reporters and editors have struggled with how to deal with the phenomenon of social networks. Now they have a chance to join the
Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas’ next Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), “Social Media for Journalists: The Basics.”
This five-week online course in English will start on Feb. 3 and conclude on Mar. 9. The MOOC will be offered for free and, while it was designed with journalists and media practitioners in mind, anyone in the world with access to the Internet is invited to participate.
The course will be divided into five weekly modules, each one with a different instructor and a different topic. All the instructors have experience with social media strategies in American news organizations.
The MOOC will give students an overview of the use of social media in journalism and best practices in finding and distributing news with these tools. Students will learn about the best journalistic uses of professional Facebook and Twitter accounts, where to find sources and story ideas on social media, how to verify information and other ethical considerations, how to cultivate an audience and a brand, developing a content strategy, and measuring success on social media.
The course will include videos, tutorials, reading materials, exercises and quizzes. Just like the Knight Center’s other MOOCs, the course will be divided in weekly modules and will be completely asynchronous, meaning there will be no live lectures. Even though students can take the course at the times of their choosing, each weekly module will have deadlines for submitting the quizzes and participating in the forums.
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