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College students’ main concerns are their grades, their social life and pleasing their parents. Watching the daily news is the least of their worries. There are three main issues that must be addressed in order to produce a newscast that will intrigue them. The first issue is that students do not have the time to watch it. The second, they feel overwhelmed by traditional reports. Lastly, students have different concerns as opposed to the current demographic that newscasts appeal too. Successfully resolving these issues will require a completely new system to be put into place.

The average college student has fifteen credit hours for their classes, which can mean thirty hours worth of studying to do outside of class per week. With the little time that students have left over they do not want to sit by the television and watch the news. From a general consensus, it is boring or not worth their time. Students are constantly multi-tasking while watching television already, by texting and social networking. This is causing a lack of attention to the reports. By featuring each story in small segments, say a minute per each, then providing them with a way to view the rest of the story via Twitter, it gives the student just a small bit of the information. So, if they are intrigued by the small bit they can find full coverage of the story by following the newscast’s Twitter feed and clicking on the link that was just posted about the specific story. Therefore, the newscast is being streamed through Twitter while simultaneously being viewed on television. By combining the two it makes the newscast more interactive and appeals to student’s methods of multi-tasking.

One thing that every student has heard is that reality is going to surprise them when they “step out into the real world.” It is the dreaded statement that induces stress on all students, and when they turn on news all they see are reports about the economy plummeting, taxes rising, houses being foreclosed, the unemployment rate skyrocketing and, as a result, the crime rate increasing. This is corrupting college students, giving them the notion that they will not succeed. However, the news never changes in essence. There will always be crime and unemployment and a resolution has never been foreseeable for any of America’s devastations. If the newscast provided students with a way to help rather than fixate on the disaster it would make the newscast more appealing. For instance, Hurricane Isaac has already caused an enormous amount of catastrophe. However, instead of focusing on the death count it should provide students with the option of helping those in need. The newscast will give them a small bit of information on the effects of the storm and then a way to help. Students will then get on Twitter, find the link and take action. This generation does not sit around and let things happen; they are doers. By not giving them any hope that things can get better it will corrupt them further, leading them to believe that when reality does hit they will be helpless.

Traditional reports are not cutting it for college students. This is most likely because the stories are not engaging. College students care a lot more about the latest Apple product as opposed to a local robbery. Students are exposed to media for a majority of their day and with things constantly being updated something that was trending yesterday is old news today. Current trends on social networks should be related to the topics being reported on the newscast to avoid old news. The current routine method of reporting is not appealing to students. So, the newscast has to be unpredictable just like the trends on social networks like Twitter.

To put it simply, a newscast that would appeal to college students has shorter segments, involves an interactive way to stream the reports while watching them on television, provides them with a way to get involved and is unpredictable.

Other factors that would make it successful would be hosts that are college students making it informal and relatable, newly released music (perhaps providing a playlist) and a new way of projecting the information (as opposed to the reporter sitting at a desk delivering it). The commercials should also be taken into consideration. Instead of the sponsors disrupting the news they would be within the report, running along a side of the screen. Ratings would soar because the newscast would be directed towards a younger audience.

I wrote for my high school newspaper for two years and as a senior I was Editor-in-Chief. The Ohio Capital Conference Academic League awarded me with The James L. McCann Excellence in Journalism Award and I was published through them. For the school newspaper we used Windows Publisher. I can guarantee I would be a hard worker for the JFreshman Newsroom.