The new question for journalism schools seems to be whether they can and will provide content for newspapers in trouble.

The Chronicle of Higher Education this week has published a number of articles on journalism, focusing on whether journalism schools should or can play a new role in providing content to mainstream media. These include “University-based reporting could keep journalism alive” by Columbia Professor Michael Schudson and former Washington Post Editor Leonard Downie. The article is an extension of their recent report, “The Reconstruction of American Journalism.” Also showcased is an article by Nicholas Lemann, which unfortunately can only be accessed if you have a subscription to the Chronicle. Perhaps it will appear later on Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism Web site, where Lemann is dean.

Two primary issues need to be addressed. One is defining appropriate content production by journalism schools, and the second is evaluating whether the decline of newspapers represents the death of journalism or the death of a particular model of journalism.

Many journalism schools are providing content using a variety of models. This is a major point of discussion among the deans of the 12 schools involved in the Carnegie-Knight Initiative on the Future of Journalism Education. The University of North Carolina School of Journalism and Mass Communication provides content for newspapers, television stations and cable channels in the state and elsewhere. The model here has been for instructors and students to shape content based on classroom work and particular goals of individual classes, and then provide that material in an open access environment. As examples, our student newscast and many other projects are carried by Time Warner cable, photo stories have been carried by CBS television station WRAL’s Web site and the Charlotte Observer, and other newspapers across the state have carried stories with particular interest in their locales. This approach has enabled professors to determine the approach and guide the students rather than having media outlets determine what the students produce. We believe the approach contributes to an open environment and allows professors and students to experiment and to contribute to the intellectual life of the university through research and development.

This fall we will open a new digital newsroom that will experiment with student work and niche audiences, incorporating research into the project. The school will create a grant system for professors wanting to do research that will benefit media industries as we move forward in the midst of the media revolution.

Journalism schools should not forget that media outlets long expected journalism schools to produce a relatively cheap labor force, even when profits were as high as 30 percent. They also should not forget that universities in the past sometimes shunned schools of journalism because they were deemed to be trade schools. Journalism schools in this era need to be looking forward - doing the research and development needed to move through the current media revolution and into the mid-21st century of journalism. Producing content to create innovation, explore the future and train students is a worthy goal. Producing content to save newspapers could become a means of providing cheap labor to a failing industry.

We are proud of our relationship with the North Carolina Press Association and the North Carolina Association of Broadcasters. We have developed many projects with them, ranging from a media law and policy center colloquium to a Latino project that produced stories and multimedia carried by many media outlets. But the media outlets in North Carolina do not expect the School of Journalism and Mass Communication to become their content producer. We work jointly to assess the future of the industry, to experiment with content and to test various business models.

The second point - the evolution of journalism across time - also is important. It is a mistake to assume that the modern commercial newspaper with an emphasis on objectivity is the form that has existed since the beginning of the country. During the formation of the country, editors were highly involved with politicians, and although some journalism historians have enjoyed characterizing that period as “The Dark Ages of American Journalism,” in truth it represented an alliance between politicians and journalists designed to build a country based on a two-party system.

The latter 19th century was characterized by strong personal journalists - editors who had a point of view and unabashedly strived to build their communities. The examples are many, including Henry Grady of Atlanta and Henry Watterson of Louisville who trumpeted the New South, and William Allen White who was considered the spokesperson for the Great Plains.

One could argue that the beginning of the decline started with the emergence of the modern objective newspaper, through which editors and corporate owners disengaged themselves from their communities.

Journalism is important to democracy but the newspapers in serious trouble because of heavy debt and corporate expansion may not be the form for the future.

Journalism schools should partner with media to experiment and innovate, not to preserve the past.

Saturday is homecoming at Carolina, and the J-school will host an open house in Carroll Hall from 1:30-3:30 p.m.

We are celebrating the centennial of journalism education at Carolina. It seems like an appropriate time to recognize the contributions alumni and friends have made for the past 100 years.

The school’s first dean, Oscar “Skipper” Coffin, and his faculty were extraordinarily loyal and committed to their students. When those students became alumni, they began what is now a long tradition of loyalty to the school.

I like to think we continue this virtuous cycle with every class, every semester and every course.

You can see the results in the generosity of our alumni and friends today. They make gifts supporting our students and faculty, and they donate their time to mentor the next generation of great journalists and media professionals.

Homecoming is all about reconnecting, celebrating accomplishments and walking with friends down memory lane. This J-school centennial homecoming comes at a time of great change for the media industries, so we are looking ahead and shaping the future of journalism education.

We’ve recently launched the Fund for the Future to support innovative multimedia projects, global experiences and networking opportunities for students.

We hope to see you in Chapel Hill this weekend. Stop by Carroll Hall to celebrate the centennial and learn how you can help shape the future of journalism education.

Today, I announced an incredible act of generosity that will fund a transformative initiative in the UNC School of Journalism and Mass Communication for our students and our faculty – and we believe for the journalism and media professions.

The school will use a $3.5 million gift from the estate of Reese Felts, a 1952 Carolina alumnus who passed away earlier this year, to develop a major student news and research initiative. It’s the largest single gift ever to the school by an individual.

We will transform a classroom into an experimental student newsroom that doubles as a research laboratory to help better understand audiences and communities that form around news.

The vision for this project is different than anything I’ve seen yet in journalism education.

These days, every good journalism school is talking about convergence, new media, new business models and innovation. Many are producing some kind of digital project. Everyone is talking about new, but I don’t think we hear enough about news.

There is a real need to re-focus on news – that essential core value of journalism – news that serves the public interest, news that promotes civic engagement, news that builds community, and news that helps citizens make informed decisions within our democracy.

The experimental newsroom creates a hub where every specialization taught in the school can work together both to produce a quality news product and to learn the best ways to reach and keep their audiences.

Collaboration across disciplines is nothing new to the school – it’s been the catalyst to some of our best work to date. But this new ongoing venture creating a dynamic and evolving news product that continually feeds into critically important research is a truly ground-breaking development.

The flexibility to experiment and test theories is central to this project. We won’t be afraid to make some mistakes along the way. This will teach students how to develop ideas and take risks and test how audiences respond – that’s how you learn, and that’s how you discover new knowledge that can serve an industry.

We have launched a national search for a proven innovator to help lead this project as a start-up student news organization supported by faculty and technical staff.

Reese Felts went to work at WSJS radio in Winston-Salem after graduation. Soon thereafter, he enlisted in the Air Force and served in Japan. After his discharge, he returned to WSJS-TV and soon began directing live local TV shows. He also was a radio announcer, promotion manager, sports network producer and television personality. He retired in 1980.

We deeply appreciate what Reese Felts has done for the school.

Tom Bowers’ book, Making News, hit newsstands last week. It is for sale at the Bull’s Head Bookshop on campus or from University of North Carolina Press.

The book chronicles 100 years of journalism and mass communication education at Carolina with sparkling tales about struggles over accreditation and deanships.

Dean’s Circle donors to the school receive a complimentary copy.

Please read the book and comment here.

And be sure to visit centennial.jomc.unc.edu for historical facts, audio, video, images and other information related to the school centennial observance.

The School of Journalism and Mass Communication, in conjunction with the Mexico City campus of Tec de Monterrey, is offering a course in spring 2010,  ”Media Landscape of the 21st Century.” Two Mexican professors will teach this cutting-edge course by video-link in English. It will explore new personal media, hand-held media and other new means of communication. Students in Chapel Hill will join their classmates in Mexico City via teleconferences and Blackboard.

Ten students from Tec and ten from UNC will be in the class. Tec de Monterrey is a pioneering, high-tech university system with more than 30 campuses across Mexico. The Mexico City campus has a respected mass communication program with outstanding professors. The teachers of this course will be Enrique Tames, dean of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, and Clark Murray, a North Carolina native.

The Carolina journalism school lost a favorite son this week when Horace Carter passed away in Tabor City, N.C.

Horace earned his UNC journalism degree in 1943, and he founded the Tabor City Tribune in 1946.

In 1953, the Tribune became the first weekly newspaper to win the Pulitzer Prize for meritorious public service. It was because Horace Carter had the courage to stand up against the Ku Klux Klan. He waged a campaign against the Klan in the face of violence and repeated threats, eventually leading to more than 100 convictions of Klansmen.

In 1991, Horace gave the school his Pulitzer gold medal, and we display it proudly in Carroll Hall. He said he wanted to inspire future journalists to fight for justice and high principles.

Our students and journalists everywhere should follow Horace Carter’s example of courage and conviction to do the right thing – whether they work for a large or small organization in a print or digital medium.

Inside Radio reported today that medium-sized businesses have shifted their marketing dollars.  For the first time, it reports, “digital media use exceeds that of radio, newspaper, television and other traditional media among small and medium-sized businesses.”  The report adds that 77% of local businesses are doing digital marketing.  Traditional media use has slipped to 69%.

Last year faculty member Dana McMahon developed a new course focusing on digital marketing.  This spring the school will add three sections of a similar course oriented toward digital marketing skills.  Our motto:  shaping the future.

For the last three years, the school has been host to journalists from the Middle East through the Edward R. Murrow international visitors program sponsored by the State Department.

Our visitors have uniformly lauded our participation in the program. One visitor said it was “fascinating to learn how American universities are open, multi-functional and play a civic role locally and internationally.”

Another said our briefings were “intense and valuable” and thoughtfully targeted to address a broad range of delegates’ interests in media, business, rule of law and pitched at a professional level suitable to their careers.

Murrow Program visitors also remarked at the “incredible” relationship between students and professors at Carolina. They said they were surprised to learn how students engage in community service work and debate social and political issues, commenting on the “independence and passion” of our students.

“We have a very clear idea now of how students are trained in participatory democracy through practical experiences on campus and in local communities. There is no specific border between academic instruction and life learning,” wrote one visitor.

This October, the school will host a group of English-speaking European visitors.

Check out www.poweringanation.org to see the work of UNC’s fantastic journalism and mass communication students. This study of energy is part of News 21, a project financed through the Carnegie-Knight Journalism Initiative.

Students are creating stories, photos, video, audio and graphics and combining them into multimedia presentations that will be posted to the Web site later this summer. The site is accompanied by a blog and information about the students doing the project in addition to the results of the project.

These innovative projects are being created by 10 UNC students and visiting students from Missouri and Harvard. They are advised by faculty members Laura Ruel and Don Wittekind. Other faculty coaches include experts in writing, photography, video, audio and programming.

In developing this project, we recognized that UNC has an advantage over other schools. While other schools have to use their grant money to hire programmers, we train our own in our visual communication program. That way we can use our grant funds more directly to enhance story and visual collection.

Data from the school’s 2009 senior survey show that students are doing well on the job market! Nearly 75 percent of students responding either had jobs upon graduation or had strong job prospects. Coupled with the traditional rate of 20 percent of seniors who go immediately to graduate school, these numbers indicate that 95 percent of all graduates are moving forward in their chosen fields.

The survey was completed by 173 students for a 48.3 percent return rate, a rate comparable with that of past surveys and greater than average survey returns. Of the 173 students responding, 30.6 percent said they had a job upon graduation. Students who did not have a job upon graduation were asked if they had significant job prospects. Sixty-three percent of those without solid jobs said they had strong job prospects.

This compares to 38 percent last year who had jobs upon graduation and 60 percent of the remainder who had strong job prospects.

For students specializing in advertising, 25 percent had jobs; in electronic journalism, 22 percent; in news-editorial, 42 percent; in public relations, 30 percent; and in visual communication, 28 percent.

For advertising students, 62 percent had strong job prospects; electronic journalism, 55 percent; news-editorial, 52 percent; public relations, 60 percent; and visual communication, 80 percent.

Students responded in roughly the same percentages as they are distributed through the specializations.