Sunday, August 23rd, 2009...6:47 pm
CustomCurriculum tailors new media lessons for journalists
So you’re a journalist who has just been laid off — or fear you might be. Your reporting and writing skills are top-notch, but you’re not too sure of yourself when it comes to video, blogging or social media. You know you ought to get some training. But you’re not even sure what you need to do first.
That’s just the type of person that CustomCurriculum, which launched in mid-August, is aimed at. It’s a new service for Knowledgewebb.net members and offers customized training for journalists, journalism professors, public relations practitioners or anyone who wants to get a jump-start on new media. (An annual Knowledgewebb membership costs $129 with discounted rates for groups, educators and nonprofits as well as members of certain affiliated organizations. The membership gives you entree into CustomCurriculum as well as access to the site’s webinars, live chats and panel of experts.)
Amy Webb, a former reporter for Newsweek and The Wall Street Journal’s Asian edition, is the principal consultant for Baltimore-based Webbmedia Group, a 3-year-old digital strategy company that founded Knowledgewebb. She contacted me recently about CustomCurriculum because she thought it might be of interest to Save the Media readers. I thought it might, too.
Webb tells me that Knowledgewebb launched in April as an outgrowth of Webbmedia Group’s efforts to provide training to journalists displaced when the Rocky Mountain News closed in February. She said she decided to start CustomerCurriculum because so many potential clients seemed unsure what skills they needed. She compares CustomCurriculum to having a personal trainer, versus just working out solo in the gym. Instead of a one-sized-fits-all approach, CustomCurriculum tailors lessons to a specific client, based on his or her goals.
“One question that I get asked the most is: If I were to learn one Web thing, what am I supposed to learn?” Webb says. “It entirely depends on who you are and what you like to do and what you need to know.”
I'm Gina Masullo Chen, a 20-year veteran newspaper journalist who is a Ph.D. candidate in mass communications. I want to see journalism survive. I believe news organizations need to embrace new media, change their thinking, improve their content and innovate. Read more about me 
1 Comment
January 29th, 2010 at 1:20 pm
When I started my busines, I used to have a chat with a guy next door and compain that there were so many options I could take, how do I choose the right one. I always remember what he told me. He said that it’s better to start digging a hole somewhere than spend all your time worrying about where to dig it. This is something I live by even today.
The net is a big place with so many options, sometimes you just have to jump in and feel the temperature to get an idea of what you should be doing. If you get it wrong, you can always follow another path.
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