Philippine E-Journals

STUDENTS’ JOURNALISTIC WRITING SKILLS: BASIS FOR TRAINING IN JOURNALISM WRITING

Mae Angelie C Pacaldo

 

Abstract:

This study was conducted to determine the level of journalistic writing skills particularly in the areas of news, editorial, feature and sports among the student-journalists of two national high schools; to examine the perceived barriers in the development of their writing skills; and to develop a journalism writing training to address the issues on students’ journalistic writing skills. This study utilized the descriptive method to assess the respondents’ journalistic writing skills and to uncover their perceived barriers in the development of these skills. Fifty (50) high school student-journalists were involved as respondents of this study. Through the aid of a questionnaire, data were collected for analysis in which percentage, mean, standard deviation and analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used. The findings showed that the journalists were still in the developing level of the journalistic writing skills for news, editorial, feature and sports writing. Furthermore, there was no significant difference in the level of journalistic writing skills considering the variables like grade level, frequency of trainings/seminars attended and the type of journalistic event participated. On the other hand, there was a significant difference in the level of journalistic writing skills of the student journalists in news, editorial, feature and sports writing. The student-journalists had significantly higher journalistic writing performance on feature and editorial unlike sports and news. In addition, the most perceived barrier in the development of the journalists’ writing skills was the lack of writing practice. Hence, there is a high need for student-journalists to develop their journalistic writing skills. It is necessary to provide them sufficient and appropriate drills and trainings. Therefore, it is recommended that the proposed journalism writing training activities be adopted in the involved schools to ensure better improvement of the journalists’ writing skills.