10 April 2008
Specialized Journalism
Beat reporting requires strong organizational and personal skills
(The following article is taken from the U.S. Department of State publication, Handbook of Independent Journalism.)
Specialized Journalism
By Deborah Potter
Many news organizations assign journalists to cover specific areas, either geographic or topical, known as “beats.” This is a term originally used to describe a regular route for a sentry or policeman. Journalists get to know the territory and people who make up their beat, and in many cases they have to learn specialized vocabulary in order to understand their sources. This does not mean they use that vocabulary in their stories. On the contrary, good beat reporters become translators and interpreters, making information that might otherwise be obscure accessible to the general public.
Beats are rare in the smallest newsrooms, where every reporter is expected to cover every kind of story. But in larger news organizations, print and broadcast, journalists may have the opportunity to focus on a particular type of news. Some beats are traditional: government, police, courts, and business, for example. Others vary with the territory. Depending on a community’s make-up, reporters might be assigned to cover the environment, or the elderly, or education as a beat.
Beat reporters have one basic responsibility: to stay on top of the news in their specialty area. They are expected to cover stories that arise on their beat – meetings, printed reports or Web postings, and other routine events – but they’re also responsible for finding news that goes beyond the obvious. Beat reporters develop stories through their own enterprise, by building relationships with sources who will keep them abreast of what’s really going on, not just in public but behind the scenes. They produce a wide variety of stories, from breaking news to feature profiles. “The best beat reporters I’ve known are well organized, determined, with a clear sense of mission, and a wide range of sources,” says Chip Scanlan, a former beat reporter for Knight Ridder newspapers and currently with The Poynter Institute.
Beat Reporting Skills
Whatever beat a journalist chooses or is assigned to cover, one basic skill is essential: the ability to understand the institutions that dominate the beat. Learning how the system works takes time and effort, but it pays off in stories that non-beat reporters can’t match. Eric Nalder, the reporter who uncovered the life raft story discussed in Chapter 2, “Getting the Story,” uses these questions to begin learning his way around a beat:
• Who are the players?
• Who is in charge?
• Who are the regulators?
• What are the rules?
• How are things done?
• Where are the mistakes recorded?
• Where is the spending recorded?
• Who knows the real story and how can I get it?
To get answers to these questions, a reporter has to study hard and “walk the beat.” Read everything you can about the topic, collect meeting schedules and agendas, subscribe to specialized publications. But most importantly, get up and go. Beat reporters cannot depend solely on the telephone; they have to spend time on the beat, meeting and talking with people. “No one ever got a story sitting around the newsroom,” says veteran American journalist Mike Mather, an investigative reporter at WTKR-TV in Norfolk, Virginia. Get to know everyone who could be helpful – from officials to clerks – and pass out your business card to everyone you meet on the beat. Build a source list with as much contact information as you can pry loose, and stay in touch with those people by making regular “beat checks.” In addition to covering the key players on the beat, a good beat reporter also looks at how their actions affect people in the community.
Beat reporting requires strong organizational and personal skills. Staying organized means using a calendar to track meetings, hearings, and due dates for reports or action. It means having a reliable, portable system for filing and retrieving contact information, especially phone numbers and e-mail addresses. And it means keeping a file of future story ideas, with daily lists of things to follow up on. Many reporters now keep this information in their computers, using programs that make it easy to search for people and dates. But they also need it when they’re not in the office, so they either carry a printout, a laptop computer, or that useful hand-held device that allows remote Web access, the personal digital assistant (PDA). Since technology can be unreliable, it’s important to make a back-up copy of the information frequently.
Covering a beat means getting to know people well enough that they will trust you, while still maintaining a professional distance. The hardest part of being a beat reporter, says Scanlan, is “dealing with sources you have to return to every day even if you’ve written a story they don’t like.”
Government and Politics
Reporters who cover government need to understand its inner workings, and to look for the impact of government decisions. Reporters who ask the basic question, “Who cares?,” when covering government are able to find people whose lives are affected by what government does. Stories that feature these people are more interesting to the audience.
Much of the business of government is conducted in meetings, so reporters on the beat should expect to cover plenty of them. A dull meeting does not justify a dull story, however. The audience depends on the journalist to tell them only what’s important, not everything that happened in chronological order. The best stories about meetings focus not on what happened in the room, but on the people who are affected by what happened.
On the government beat, it’s critical for journalists to know how to read and interpret a budget and other financial statements. “Follow the money” is good advice for all journalists, but particularly for those covering government and politics. Stories about government funding may seem dry, but taxes and spending affect the audience directly and people need to know where their money is going. In general, documents are the lifeblood of government, so beat reporters must be able to obtain them and understand them.
Political reporters in a democracy have one central mission: to provide citizens with the information they need to make an informed choice between the candidates for elective office. To do that, journalists need to examine the candidates’ backgrounds and qualifications, their positions on the key issues, and what the candidates are saying in campaign appearances and advertising. Reporters who cover politics look at the candidates’ supporters, too, since their interests can often shed light on what a politician will do if elected.
Public opinion surveys are a staple of campaign coverage, but journalists need to look closely before deciding whether a poll’s results are worth reporting. “Horse-race” or “tracking” polls that tell the percentage of voters who support each candidate are of limited value except as a fleeting snapshot of the race on any given day. Some journalists believe these polls may actually bias voters in favor of the leading candidate because people generally want to support a winner. But researchers in the United States have discovered that voters who pay attention to polls also learn more about the issues involved in the campaign. The researchers’ advice to journalists is to keep reporting the results of legitimate “tracking” polls throughout the campaign, but not to make them a major focus of the coverage.
When it comes to campaign issues, journalists should pay attention not only to what the candidates say but also to what the voters want to know. Many news organizations conduct “issue polls” to see what topics are of great interest to the public during an election year. Sometimes candidates may try to avoid discussing a controversial issue that matters deeply to voters. In that case, journalists should raise the questions the public is asking. Good political reporters do not simply point out where the candidates stand on the issues, they ask what the candidates have done about those issues in previous elected office or in other positions they may have held. To bring the issues to life, reporters look for people whose individual stories illustrate why the issues matter and what difference it would make if one candidate or the other wins the election.
Business and Economics
The business beat touches the lives of almost everyone. Unemployment, the cost of food and fuel, personal savings and investment, all of these topics matter not just to business leaders but also to workers and consumers. Covering the local business beat means reporting on employers and workers, construction and property sales, as well as the business sectors that keep the local economy going, be it farming, manufacturing, mining, or health care. At the national level, business reporters cover more abstruse topics, such as commodity and stock markets, interest rates, and institutional debt.
Reporters covering business and economics have to make their stories accessible to a general audience. They must understand economic concepts and terms and be able to define or restate them in plain language. This is good practice even for reporters working for specialized publications or broadcasts, whose audience might be expected to be familiar with the terms. In the United States, for example, The Wall Street Journal is aimed at business-savvy readers, but still it spells out the meaning of common terms like “gross national product,” the total value of a nation’s output of goods and services. Over time, business reporters develop their own list of concise definitions they can plug into their stories. The audience will appreciate a clear statement of what is meant by “debt conversion,” “currency devaluation,” “privatization,” and other economic terms. They will appreciate stories that explain why those concepts matter to individuals as well as to corporations and governments.
Business reporters need to be able to read and understand financial statements, balance sheets, and annual reports. They often find stories by looking at changes in income or spending from year to year. They compare companies to others in the same industry or the same region. For example, when a business closes or fails, reporters will ask not only how many people have lost their jobs but also what impact the shutdown will have on the community. To answer that larger question, they need to know whether the company was one of the largest employers in the area, whether other local companies provide the same product or service, what the local unemployment rate is, and so on.
The business beat requires a deeper knowledge of mathematics and statistics than most other topic areas. But business reporters should use numbers sparingly in their stories, because too many figures make a story dry and dull. The most compelling business stories show the significance of developments by putting them in human terms, describing how individuals have been or will be affected.
Health, Science, and the Environment
Stories about health and the environment have a direct impact on people’s lives. Reporters who cover AIDS know that ignorance can be almost as dangerous as the disease itself; their stories can educate people so they can protect themselves. Journalists on the health, science, and environment beat may report about everything from avian flu to the mapping of the human genome and the effects of damming rivers. For each of these topics, the underlying issues are complicated and the journalist’s job is to explain them clearly.
When dealing with these kinds of stories, journalists need to be familiar with the language of scientists and medical researchers, which can be confusing to laymen. Don’t be intimidated by it, says reporter Dennis Bueckert of the Canadian Press news agency, and don’t use it in your stories, either. Like business reporters, science writers develop their own list of definitions and explanations for complicated terms so they can write stories that make sense to the general public.
Reporters who cover scientific subjects need to understand the scientific method, basic mathematics, and statistics, so they can double-check the results of research studies. At the same time, they should resist the urge to turn every development into a breakthrough, or to press for “yes” or “no” answers instead of accepting probabilities. Their stories may not seem as dramatic but they will certainly be more accurate.
Journalists who are trained to report all sides of a story often fall into a trap when covering science. Giving even-handed coverage to differing scientific opinions can actually mislead the audience. For example, the overwhelming majority of scientists believe that exposure to lead can harm children’s intelligence levels. Only a few researchers dispute the connection. A reporter could mention both viewpoints, but not in such a way as to suggest there is no scientific consensus on the issue.
Carol Rogers, a journalism professor at the University of Maryland who has edited books about science writing, has two useful tips for beat reporters. First: identification matters. Journalists often don’t identify the experts they quote in a meaningful way. The audience deserves to know why you are quoting a particular person. For example, a story about an international conference on climate change quoted the head of the White House Office of Science and Technology, but never mentioned that he was a respected climate scientist. Providing that information would have allowed the audience to better assess the validity of his comments.
Second, Rogers says, audiences don’t bring anywhere near the background journalists do to any kind of story, much less to complicated ones. So, if you’re covering a science conference, for example, do not assume your audience has heard or read yesterday’s story, or that they’ll hear tomorrow’s. Give them the background they need to understand the issue and do it as if your story were the only one they would ever read or hear on the subject. It may well be.
Police and Courts
Reporters who cover crime and the courts need to know how the system works. Few reporters have any training in criminal justice, but veterans on the police beat recommend taking at least one course on the subject. Police officials are notoriously reluctant to provide information to journalists, but if you know their rules, regulations, and procedures, you can ask better questions and improve your chances of finding out what you want to know.
Police reporters need to know exactly how crimes are defined in the community they cover. In the United States, for example, a “burglary” and a “robbery” are not the same thing. Burglary involves breaking into a building to commit a crime. Robbery is stealing money or property by force. Developing a glossary of essential terms can prevent embarrassing mistakes. A police press release may provide the basic facts about a crime, but good reporters dig deeper. They go to the scene to look for details and to talk with neighbors or eyewitnesses, whenever possible.
Court reporters must understand the judicial process from beginning to end. They should know what happens when a suspect is arrested, charged, arraigned, tried, and sentenced or released. Experienced reporters say the best way to learn the process is to spend time at the courthouse. Begin with the court clerks, who keep track of the docket – the list of cases – and the calendar. Find out how to get copies of the court record, filings, and testimony. Read the case files --including motions and pleadings before the trial – and keep track of what’s reported about the case if you can’t be in court every day, which frequently happens.
Defense attorneys are some of the best sources of information on the justice beat. They often are more willing than prosecutors to talk with reporters about cases on which they are working. Do your best to understand legal jargon, but avoid using it in your stories. “Lawyers are counseled to use big words to confuse journalists,” says S.L. Alexander, author of Covering the Courts: A Handbook for Journalists. “If you don’t know what something means, ask the person you’re interviewing to explain it,” she advises.
Sports
Sports reporters do some of the best writing in journalism. Their stories naturally involve drama, emotions, and outsized personalities, says former TV sports reporter Bill Schwanbeck, who now teaches at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut. Good sportswriters do much more than report the score of a game or the results of an athletic competition. They provide the basics, of course, but they also provide perspective and context that the audience can’t get from being at the game or watching it on television. Sportswriters explain the why and how of what happened, not just the who and the what. They also report on the business of sports, and write feature stories about athletes, team owners, and fans.
But sports reporters still have to start with the fundamentals. They need to be knowledgeable about all sports, understand the rules of the game or sport they are covering, and how the score is determined. They work on very tight deadlines, especially when covering night games. They have to keep score and make notes at the same time, not an easy task during a fast-moving game. Most importantly, they need to find a theme for each story and build the details around it.
In many cases, the best story is not on the field. Sportswriters probe for what’s happening behind the scenes, the atmosphere in the locker room, or the tension between two players that might be affecting the entire team. They treat players and managers with respect, but they do not engage in hero-worship. They often enjoy the sports they cover, but they are not fans or boosters of any one team. Like all journalists, they should be fair and independent observers of the stories they cover.
Just as business and science reporters avoid economic and business jargon, sportswriters should avoid terms that only the most ardent fan or coach would know. “Keep it simple,” says former sports reporter Mike Reilley, now publisher of the online site The Journalist’s ToolBox. “Don’t get cute.” He also warns young journalists to expect some interviews with athletes and coaches to be confrontational, especially after a loss. Many professional athletes thrive on intimidation, Reilley says, so be prepared to stand your ground.
QUESTIONS JOURNALISTS SHOULD ASK ABOUT POLLS
• Who did the poll? Is this a legitimate survey organization? Who else do they poll for?
• Who paid for the poll? What is their political agenda?
• How many people were interviewed?
• How were they selected?
• What kinds of people were interviewed?
• Are the results based on answers of all or some of those polled?
• When was the poll conducted?
• How was the poll conducted?
• What were the questions?
• What was the margin of error? What were the raw numbers?
• Are the results different from other polls and, if so, why?
• Is this poll worth reporting?
[Excerpted with permission from 20 Questions a Journalist Should Ask About Poll Results, Third Edition, by Sheldon R. Gawiser, Ph.D., and G. Evans Witt. (http://www.ncpp.org)]
[Deborah Potter is executive director of NewsLab, an online resource center for journalists in Washington, D.C., that she founded in 1998. She has taught journalism as a faculty member at The Poynter Institute and at American University, and spent more than 20 years in TV news, including 16 as a network correspondent for CBS News and CNN.]
