[Note to students: This was written in 1997 by grad student Cathleen Hockman-Wert. Although it may need a bit of updating, I think you’ll find the basic info to be very useful. – Tom Wheeler]
Are there Web resources for student writers? Are you kidding? The following list is not even remotely comprehensive, but highlights some of the best picks out there. Note that the categories overlap quite a bit; in this list the Web sites are classified according to what may be their greatest strengths for student users.
If you keep only one bookmark to a writing Web site, the American Journalism Review hompage (http://www.newslink.org/menu.html) would be a strong candidate. The AJR page has links to just about everything, including 4,000+ newspapers and magazines, wire services, journalism organizations, and much more.
AJR’s Top 10 List offers a good introduction to on-line news publications. You’ll find things like:
the New York Times (which doesn’t charge U.S. residents for use, although registration is required) (http://www.nytimes.com/).
CNN Interactive (http://www.cnn.com/).
USA Today (http//www.usatoday.com) (which, among other publications even has an on-line crossword puzzle),
Time (http://pathfinder.com/@@SPBpnAcAwVFQRfSx/time/),
the Wall Street Journal (http://wsj.com/), and
the Christian Science Monitor (http//www.csmonitor.com/) (CSM has a searchable index of all its articles since 1980).
Some of these sites include e-mail staff directories, and some have forums for readers’ questions. At the Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/), for example, editor Leonard Downie Jr. and managing editor Robert G. Kaiser have a page in which they "try to answer readers’ questions from time to time."
Links to journalism publications include:
Copy Editor (http://www.copyeditor.com/),
Columbia Journalism Review (http//www.cjr.org/),
NetWatch (http://www.pulver.com/netwatch/topten/tt26. htm), EXTRA! (the bi-monthly magazine of Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting, FAIR) (http://www. fair.org/fair/extra/),
Advertising Age (http//www.adage.com/),
and various British and Canadian publications.
Some, like Presstime Online (http://www.naa.org/ptime/), also include staff listings with e-mail addresses and phone numbers – a great resource if you’re working on a communications-related paper and want to consult a professional.
Some notable listservs you can find through AJR include –
AJR is also a helpful source of links to statistics on the Internet (including American Demographics, Bureau of the Census, Gallup, Statistical Abstract of the United States).
Job-hunters can turn to AJR’s JobLink (http://www.newslink.org/joblink.html), which allows you to search by specialty (reporter, copy editor, etc.) medium (magazines, public relations, etc.) region of the United States, and experience.
Don’t stop your job hunt at AJR. You might also check J-Jobs from the University of California at Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism (http://www.journalism.berkeley.edu/resources/jobs/). It isn’t as easy to search as JobLink, but it does include openings.
Another good possibility is the National Diversity Journalism Job Bank (http://newsjobs.com/) sponsored by the Florida Times-Union. It says it’s the "most comprehensive list of journalism openings on the Internet," but I wouldn’t know. Editor & Publisher Interactive (http://www.medianinfo.com/) claims it has a "reputation as the leading marketplace for newspaper jobs." E & P Interactive Classifieds includes jobs in "New Media" and is updated weekly.
On-line writing labs
But before worrying about the job thing, we gotta get through J-school. When in need, fly to an OWL: an On-line Writing Lab. Dozens of universities have them. And fortunately, they’re willing to share their resources. OWLs offer pages of tips on every imaginable aspect of writing. Some have quiz sheets so you can practice using correct punctuation and grammar. Some have on-line tutors. Almost all include lists of links to other OWLs and Web writing resources. Here’s just a sample.
The Purdue University Writing Lab (http://owl.english.purdue.edu/) is the most famous OWL, and for good reason: it has zillions of handouts with detailed information.. "Troublesome verbs" is just one of dozens of handouts in the grammar section. At Purdue you’ll find one of the best selections of interactive exercises around, plus links to MLA style handouts. Note the particularly helpful pages on paraphrasing , proofreading strategies, and how to use statistics responsibly.
Rensselaer (Polytechnic Institute) Writing Center (http://www.rpi.edu/dept/Ilc/writecenter/web/handouts.html) has lots of good handouts, too, including an especially good one on "Suggestions for Revising Prose": a checklist to help make your writing more interesting.
Also worth noting are Rensselaer’s essays on developing a thesis.
The HyperGrammar site at the University of Ottawa (http://www.ottawa.ca/academic/arts/writcent/hypregrammar/grammar.html) is also strong along the "how to develop a thesis and outline" lines (the bilingual English/French version may be handy to some). Many of their pages were written with academic papers in mind, but most of the points apply equally well to good journalism.
The Texas A & M Writing Center (http://www-english.tamu.edu/files/writingcenter/) offers a detailed step-by-step guide, beginning with composing a thesis and continuing through polishing.
Jack Lynch’s writing page from University of Pennsylvania (http://dept.english.upenn.edu/~jlynch/writing.html) has an eclectic list of Resources for Writers and Writing Instructors. Among scarier things which remain nameless, you’ll find a link to the Gender-Free Pronoun FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page (http://www.eecis.udel.edu/~chao/gfp/), which looks like someone’s thesis, and the lyrics of Schoolhouse Rock ("Conjunction Junction," along with other classics) (http://www.apolcalypse.org/pub/u/gilly/Schoolhouse_Rock/HTML/grammar/grammar.html).
The DeVry Writing Support Center (http://www.primenet.com/~stegall/ or http://www.devry-phx.edu/Irnresrc/dowsc/)). offers lots of good links, particularly a set of sites on critical thinking under Instructor Resources.
For a comprehensive list of OWLs, refer to the National Writing Centers Association (http://www2.colgate.edu/diw/NWCAOWLS.html). This site has a handy index of handouts provided by all these writing centers. It also lists all the OWLs that offer tutoring by e-mail.
Tutors at owls
One of these OWLs is the University of Michigan’s On-line Writing Lab (http://www-personal.umich.edu/~nesta/OWL/owl.html). Compared to some tutoring services, which only respond to specific questions, U-Michigan tutors will actually read your whole paper. As they say: "The OWL is not a proofreading service, and we will not revise your paper for you. We will provide comments and suggestions based on what you tell us you need help with." U-Michigan students get priority for tutors’ attention, but tutors will help folk from other universities.
The Online Writery of the University of Missouri (http://www.missouri.edu/~wleric/writery.html) not only has a goal of cybertutor response within 24 hours of request – it also hosts ZooMoo: a multi-user dungeon, Object Oriented. Through ZooMoo you can converse in real time with whoever else is on-line. For more information about MOOs, refer back to the National Writing Centers Association.
Other tutoring services
If you have a short question about grammar or copy editing, you might try going local. The Portland State University Writing Helpline is reachable by phone (503 725-3570) or e-mail (wrcenter@lucy.ch.pdx.edu). They’re open Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. To find more such answer-people, refer to the Grammar Hotline Directory 1996 (http://www.infi.net/tcc/tcresourc/hotline.html).
If you’re really desperate and have some extra cash burning in your pocket, you can always use Writing Assessment Services (http://members.aol.com/cmarsch786/index.htm). A supposedly genuine college English instructor will "do an extensive evaluation of a student’s writing from one assignment or a portfolio," all for the low, low cover fee of $10, plus $1.50 per 100 words. But I’d stick with the OWLs.
Copy editing
The Bill Walsh Copy Editor’s Page (http://www.theslot.com/), by a long-time professional, is definitely worth looking at. His "Curmudgeon’s Stylebook" is designed as a supplement to the Associated Press Stylebook, with discussion of everything form proper usage of "baloney" (exaggerated talk) versus "bologna" (the lunchmeat) to a section on "Matters of Sensitivity," which addresses using "African-American" versus "black," etc. If you have a question and your AP Stylebook doesn’t help, this is the place to check. That’s no baloney.
Copy Editing for Magazines (http://www.well.com/user/mmcadams/copy.editing.html), a course homepage by Mindy McAdams (former copy editor at Time magazine and the Washington Post), includes a resource list, copy editing quizzes, and links to reference books and Web sites related to editing. A helpful guide to vocabulary for copy-editors (what the heck is a predicate nominative anyway?) can be found under Words About Words.
Communication research
When researching communication-related topics, you might try using the Index to Journalism Periodicals from the University of Western Ontario (http://www.uwo.ca/journ/ijp.html). You’ll get references like those you’d find on Janus, but won’t have to slog through as many unrelated hits on, say, chemistry. I searched for "alter quotes" and got 16 hits from publications like Quill.
Editor & Publisher Interactive (http://www.mediainfo.com/) is among the on-line publications that have good information related to cyberjournalism. A recent issue included articles called "Print Journalists vs. Cyber Journalists." "Latin America’s Interactive Newspapers," and "Killer College Newspaper Web Sites." The Editorial Eye magazine (http://www.eei-alex.com/eye/) is a 12-page monthly newsletter originating in Alexandria, Va.
Graduate students in particular will appreciate some of the resources related to communications scholarship from the Undergraduate Writing Center at the University of Texas at Austin (http://www.utexas.edu/depts/uwc/.html/writing.html). They offer handouts on media history, theory, and methodology – for example, a great paper called "Semiotics for Beginners."
Reference desk
Reference must-have’s include:
Strunk’s classic guide, The Elements of Style (http://www.cc.columbia.edu/acis/bartleby/strunk/) and
the searchable Merriam-Webster’s WWWebster Dictionary (http://www.m-w.com/dictionary), 10th edition.
Carnegie Mellon University’s list of on-line reference works (http://www.cs.cmu.edu/references.html) has links to dictionaries in French, German, Japanese, Spanish, and Solvene. From here you can also search a 1911 Roget’s Thesaurus (http://humanities.uchicago.edu/forms_unrest/ROGET.html) or look up quotes from Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations (1901 version, but hey, it’s handy) (http://www.cc.columbia.edu/acis/bartleby/bartlett/).
For more than 300 links to full-text "Classic Works" of fiction, drama, and poetry, go to John Hewitt’s Writer’s Resource Center (http://www.azstarnet.com/~poewar/writer/writer.html). The Electronic Text Collection at the University of Virginia (http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/english.html) also has links to works of classic literature, philosophy, and poetry on-line, including searchable electronic text versions of the King James Bible and the Koran.
Mr. Puddy’s Reference Desk (http://www.sils.umich.edu/~nscherer/RefDesk.html) is a manageably-sized, basic list of links, ranging from the Area Code Index to government documents to the Library of Congress to the weather to World Factbook to Ticketmaster Online. Mr. Puddy also includes links to several dictionaries (foreign languages, computing, acronyms, and more).
Bulletin boards, listservs, and e-mail, oh my!
If you’re ever interested in listening in or joining discussion among other writers, AJR isn’t a bad place to look for listservs. You can also explore Mail Discussion and News Groups for Writers (http://www.ia.net/~lynda/writers/news.html), which includes a listing for a freelance magazine writers listserv. Don’t forget to consider the literary journalism listserv moderated by UO’s own Jon Franklin (although I understand there is a small fee for joining).
"Literary vagabonds" will find a home at the Writer’s Block BBS home page (http://www.accsyst.com/writers/bbs.htm). Most of these bulletin board links seem to be on the fiction/poetry end of the spectrum, but there’s probably journalists out there, too.
If you’re searching for a particular professional journalist, go to The Reporters Network (http://www.reporters.net/), which claims to have the most comprehensive e-mail directory of journalists, editors, producers, and freelance writers available on the Internet.
Miscellaneous
Check in with the Society of Professional Journalists (http://town.hall.org/places/spj/) for information on this organization, to see its code of ethics, and for a good list of links to resources on freedom of information issues. The link to the SPJ publication, Quill, only brings up lists of story titles, not the full-text articles themselves.
To see what other student journalists are doing on-line, call up the College Press Network (http://www.cpnet.com/). This site offers its list of best on-line college newspapers, but also gives links to all of its member publications. Mostly college students are on the CPN staff, and represent schools ranging from the University of Miami to Mt. Hood Community College
Explore and enjoy!