The news stories I look forward to following on national, state, and local levels are news in regards to theatre and about my local communities of Appleton and Whitewater. I have always been a theatre lover my entire life and I love to learn about new developments in the theatre, and I also think it is important to keep up-to-date on issues that are impacting people who are close to me.
When looking for news happening in Appleton, I usually visit Action 2 News (WBAY) to learn about what is going on. I like this website because it is straightforward and easy to look at. In Whitewater, I usually turn to the Daily Union for the same reason. However, when I am looking to find more about one story in particular, I usually do a simple Google Search to see multiple different versions of a story and to get multiple sides of the issue.
When I read a story online, I usually like to watch the video first to get a broad overview of what is happening. Then, I go to the text and read more in-depth to look for more specific details. Sometimes I like to scroll through the pictures depending on the story. For example, the story about Jayme Closs was one where I found I wanted to familiarize myself with the images.
Overall, my favorite way to get news is by watching the videos. To me, it is more captivating to listen to somebody tell a story then just to read it. Also, sometimes the broadcasters will input their own ideas and I like to hear that.
Sometimes I find my news via Facebook. When I do, occasionally I will interact by tagging somebody I know in the comments if I know the story is something that they would be interested in. I follow a lot of liberal news pages, so I get my news from many feminist, LGBT, and race oriented pages. I do not use twitter, but I can imagine that if I did I would get very similar news stories to the ones I already get on Facebook.
I have a friend whose mom has a blog called Another Slice that I read from time to time. She posts a lot of good stories about her family and about our hometown or Appleton that are very interesting to read.
I have never submitted content to a news organization or e-mailed a reporter about their story. However, as I progress in journalism I think this would be something for me to start getting in to. It would be a good way for me to get my feet wet before diving completely in.
When trying to access if the news I read is accurate, I like to make sure it is from a common source like CNN, BBC, etc. I also look for typos and grammar mistakes, because if they were careless in that regard, they were also probably careless about fact-checking.
In conclusion, the stories that interest me the most revolve around theatre, Appleton, and Whitewater. I like to watch the news stories, but I also think it’s important to read about them to get the finer details. For my next steps, I think I need to get more involved in responding to news stories and taking it to the next level. This will be something for me to work on this semester and beyond.