Ten Reasons You Should Take Journalism Classes, and Lots of Them

Nicole Quigley is the author of Like Moonlight at Low Tide (Blink / Zondervan), winner of the ACFW Carol Award for young adult fiction. You can connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and check out her writing playlist on her author website. It is sure to make you want to fall in love (or become a surfer) on the Gulf of Mexico. 

For those who love creative writing, the idea of studying journalism may seem like a dose of bad medicine. News writing is fact-based and objective. Fiction writers like to invent their own facts and then take a side! That’s probably why so many aspiring writers prefer to take classes like Screenwriting 101 rather than Media Ethics.

But learning how to find and write news stories may be among the greatest foundational skills a fiction writer can obtain.

After working with the media for more than a dozen years in the field of public relations (and having worked for two newspapers, myself), I have learned an important lesson: reporters make for tremendous storytellers. Many reporters working in newsrooms around the world are among the best writers of our day, even though they may never write a bestselling novel.  

It’s no accident that so many of the most influential fiction writers of the last 100 years all have a background in newswriting. Do the hard work of learning how to be a reporter, and you’ll be following in the footsteps of John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, Margaret Mitchell, Francine Rivers, and Nora Ephron, just to name a few.

With today’s more highly specialized high school programs and college majors, it may well be possible to obtain a degree in English or Creative Writing and never really learn the technique of newswriting. True journalism is both a skill and art that one masters over the course of a long career, but even learning basic techniques can vastly help your fiction writing.  

Here are ten reasons you should take journalism classes and gain newsroom experience whenever you can:

1. Your writing will get tighter. You’ll write shorter sentences that pack a punch. (When you choose to wax poetic in your fiction work, you’ll have greater control and purpose. Even fiction readers have very little tolerance for fatty writing.)

2. You’ll get more chances at bat. News pieces are shorter, typically not exceeding 800 words. That means you’ll write more stories, and submit them more frequently, for editing. (For writers of any kind, editing = growth.)

3. You’ll learn how to identify and assemble the parts of a news story like pieces in a puzzle, and you’ll learn how to cut the pieces that don’t matter. The essential parts of every news article are “The Five Ws” of who, what, when, where, and why. (In fiction, we use these same pieces, but we call them characters, conflict and plot, setting, and motivation. When you know how to assemble a news story, you’ll be better able to plot your fiction manuscript.)

4. You’ll write under breaking deadlines in real time. If the sheer pressure doesn’t throw you into a caffeine binge coma, you’ll come through it being a faster and more effective writer. (Finding time to complete your fiction manuscript will be among your greatest challenges. Knowing how to use your time efficiently is an asset.)

5. You’ll learn how to truly copyedit your work masterpiece. (Odds are your fiction editor will use many copyediting terms borrowed from the newsroom, and you’ll need to understand them.)

6. You’ll become an expert story pitcher. When you talk to your newsroom editors, they’ll ask, “What’s your story about?” The next question they’ll ask: “Why should I care?” (When you try to land your first agent or book deal, they’ll ask the same thing.) 

7. You’ll interview people and learn how to get great quotes. (Many fiction writers consider writing dialogue one of the most difficult parts of the craft.)  

8. You’ll learn how to research, how to source, and how to distill complex issues into digestible, but still accurate, information. (In fiction writing, you’ll seek experts and information to make your story believable. Masters of this skill include David Baldacci and Tom Clancy.)   

9. You’ll be more employable, which you’ll need before writing that bestseller. (True journalists love reporting and do it well because it is a great passion. But even if you don’t want to be a reporter, understanding the basics of journalism is a practical skill that offers applications for many professions, even if you never step foot in a newsroom. Just ask anyone in marketing, politics, or law.)

10. Journalists like to comfort the afflicted or afflict the comfortable. Journalists write stories that take their readers into new worlds to meet new people. (Fiction writers are no different. Any experience you can obtain in a newsroom will broaden your understanding of the human experience and fuel your imagination for years to come.)  

What do you think? Does newswriting appeal to you? Was your favorite author ever a journalist? How has your experience in journalism classes or working in a newsroom impacted your fiction writing?

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