Advancing The Story: Why Missouri J-School is asking students to have iPhones

While iPhones could be a tool for students to experiment with mobile journalism, the journalism school at the University of Missouri is making the device a requirement for new students for another reason entirely: the institute is going to make its lectures available for free on iTunes.

Is this requirement necessary, asks Deborah Potter, especially if students can access them through iTunes.

But a good free resource for non-Missouri students too.

Full post at this link…

4 thoughts on “Advancing The Story: Why Missouri J-School is asking students to have iPhones

  1. Kathy Gill

    Misleading headline — the “requirement” is for iPodTouch or iPhone.

    Moreover, the reason is pretty mundane:

    From the primary source, The Columbia Missourian – linked to in the source you’ve linked to (above):

    “The reason we put required on it is to help the students on financial need,” Brooks said. “If it’s required, it can be included in your financial need estimate. If we had not required it, they wouldn’t be able to do that.”

    It’s the same reason that I make some books “required” in my courses. Universities and professors try to work around rules to help students — of course, it helps to note (somewhere) that the “requirement” is, in reality, optional. The primary source of this story does just that.

  2. Kathy Gill

    Thanks for the clarification. I think the bigger story is the arcane and micro-management rules of the U.S. financial aid program. :-/

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