COMM 337: 2nd 1,000-word analysis - op-ed column

From our syllabus -

Students will create a web Log (blog) and write analyses professional writing of 1,000 words each of: (a) a newspaper feature story, (b) a magazine feature, (c) a piece of public affairs reporting and (d) an opinion or op-ed piece on the blog.

Your assignment: Write an analysis of the op-ed column linked below. Post it to your blog and turn in a hard copy, either in person or by email in Microsoft Word format, to me by the beginning of class Tuesday, Oct. 18.

Our opinion piece is a recent column on a neighborhood dispute by Mary Schmich of The Chicago Tribune ... it's not at all like your standard editorial, that harumphs around about some political issue and comes to some kind of conclusion. For that, you can go to the Trib, Chicago Sun-Times or Springfield's own State Journal-Register, or any other newspaper in the land, any day of athe week. I like this one much better. It reads more like a feature story. And it doesn't come right out and state an opinion till the very end.

When I started newspapering, somebody told me the perfect editorial would go kind of like this: "Fact. Fact. Fact. Fact. Fact. Fact. Fact. Fact. The conclusion is obvious." Schmich's is kind of like that.

Well, that's what I think.

But maybe it's a matter of opinion. Schmich is writing an opinion piece, after all. What's your opinion? Backed, of course, by witty, trenchant, well-written, well-argued analysis.

Tim Harrower, former editor of The Portland Oregonian and author of the textbook Inside A Practical Guide to the Craft of Journalism (Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2007), has these tips on how to write an editorial:

• Keep it tight. [By this he means keep it short and simple.]
  
• Keep it relevant.
  
• Take a stand.
  
• Attack issues, not personalities.
  
• Don't be a bully.
  
• Control your anger.
  
• Write a strong lead and a solid finish. (27)

On the next page (271), he adds: "Base your opinions on facts - and present those facts. It's a delicate balancing act: If you leap to conclusions without providing facts to support them, readers will think you're just a raving loon. Yet if the facts crowd out your commentary, you're just rehashing old news."

And he has words of advice for columnists, too. They're on the handouts I gave you in class Tuesday, and they're on pages 130 and 131 of the book. Read them and analyze Mary Schmich's column in Harrower's terms - how does she stack up against the principles he explains? Why? Give examples. What would Don Murray think of her piece? Would he consider consider it a piece of craftsmanship or a work of art? Why? Give examples? What's your overall evaluation of the piece?