Ranking The Journalism Classes I’ve Taken at Annenberg

by Tamanna Sood ‘24

Throughout my four years as a journalism major at Annenberg, I have taken a plethora of journalism courses, some that I have enjoyed and others that I hated. My experience in classes at Annenberg has been a rollercoaster. While some classes have served me well and taught me a lot about the field of journalism, others have felt repetitive and lacking a critical structure. To help you navigate classes and validate your confusion for some prerequisites, I have reviewed and ranked all of the journalism courses I have taken at Annenberg!

1. JOUR 323: Journalism and the Audience [2 units]

JOUR 323 is by far the most helpful and engaging class I have taken at Annenberg. I took this class in the fall semester of my junior year while I was seriously considering changing my major, and it reminded me of exactly why I loved journalism and media. Essentially, this class is designed for students to explore creating their own product, whether that be a podcast, TikTok, Instagram, or newsletter. I chose to dedicate my product to the South Asian community and taboos within our community. Running my own passion project taught me so much about journalism and why it's important to amplify marginalized  voices and share life stories. This class elevated my love for storytelling, and it felt so gratifying to work on a product that interested me deeply. 

Professor Robert Hernandez  (Profe., as he likes to be called) was one of the highlights of class as he was able to share a great deal of insight on working in the industry. Before this class, I had a very binary view of journalism and believed that print media and broadcast journalism were the only career paths. Hearing about Profe’s long and diverse career history was really interesting, and it was nice to hear how Profe was able to grow and work in multiple forms of journalism throughout his career. Profe also had an incredible network and was able to bring in many guest speakers who had equally fascinating career paths in journalism and had great insight to share. 

That being said, this class is a lot of work for a two unit course. I’d recommend it to everyone, but it requires a lot of work and dedication that may go beyond that of a typical two unit course.

I’ve previously written in detail about why and how much I enjoyed this course, and I encourage interested students to check that out!  

In Summary: This course taught more about journalism than other courses I have taken at USC. 

2. JOUR 320: Introduction to Coding for Storytelling [2 units]

JOUR 320 was one of my favorite pre-requisite courses at Annenberg for a multitude of reasons. I took this class in the spring semester of my sophomore year with adjunct professor Priya Krishnakumar.  The course allowed me to explore coding which had always felt so inaccessible and foreign to me. I had a preconceived notion that coding was something that I would never understand when that couldn’t have been further from the truth. This class opened my eyes to a new passion and a new career path that I never even considered. JOUR 320 even led me to pursue more specialized knowledge in web development! 

If you are a first time coder (which most people in the class are), don’t be intimidated. The class is designed to help beginners gain a good understanding of  HTML, CSS, and basic Javascript. Professors are always willing to help students outside of class and even personally give one-on-one help during class. 

In Summary: It's a great course that opened my eyes to a new career path, but it's completely understandable that some might not enjoy the class or find it difficult. I believe that it should be an elective class and not a prerequisite because some people won’t necessarily use these skills in the future, though they can greatly complement a journalism career. 

3. JOUR 372: Engaging Diverse Communities [2 units]

JOUR 372 is a prerequisite class I still think about often and enjoyed thoroughly! I almost wish this class was a four unit course and we had the opportunity to dive in deeper. I took this class with adjunct professor Gabby Fernandez who graduated from Annenberg in 2020! Gabby was the kindest and sweetest professor I have had the pleasure of taking a class with at USC. She was able to give so much insight into the journalism field and relate to us as students because she was in our shoes not too long ago. 

She made the class interesting and fun by allowing students to take the lead in discussions about diversity in the newsroom and how to consider marginalized groups in journalism. We also were allowed to highlight and focus on specific communities that interested us. I, for example, chose to focus on South Asian creatives in the Los Angeles area. The class operated a lot like a seminar where students had the opportunity to both take part in and lead discussions. Assignments required us to reach out to community members and bring fresh perspectives to class. 

In Summary: I loved this class dearly, but I wish it had a little more structure. I also feel like it would have benefitted from the chance to go more in-depth on these important topics.

4. JOUR 321: Visual Journalism [2 units]

I took this class during my fall semester sophomore year with adjunct professor Robert Meeks III. Professor Meeks, at the time, worked at LA Times and had such great insight about working in digital media for a local newspaper. He was able to convey to us why it was important to know how to effectively use social media and how to best use it for the purpose of sharing news. I learned a lot, in particular, about photography in this course. We were trained on the basics of taking good pictures for a photo story and how to best frame interviews. 

This is another prerequisite class I wish could have been four units. While all the information I was learning in class was imperative, I wish there was more time to go deeper. Due to the brevity of the class and the fact we met only once a week, the course felt a little rushed. I wish the class was given a higher weight and a longer time to meet as I believe a lot of the skills we learn in this class are extremely important for all multimedia journalists to know. 

In Summary: Loved the class, but I wish we had been able to explore more topics. 

5. JOUR 412: Podcasting: Origin Stories [2 units]

JOUR 412 was a two-unit upper division elective course I took second semester of my junior year. I took this class with Willa Seidenberg during her last semester teaching. The class was about the history of podcasting and how the medium originated. We were required to listen to a podcast episode of a podcast of our choice each week and document it in our podcast journal. Willa brought a lot of different guest speakers to class that were able to give great insight on being on the radio or running a podcast. 

The class operated like a seminar and was very discussion focused. The assignments were all fairly straightforward, and the work expected was average for a two unit class. Although this class great overall, it made me realize that I didn’t necessarily like podcasting and radio as much as I thought. Some of the readings and listenings were dry, but the class discussion was always really interesting. This class also had a really fun trip at the end of the semester to DubLab Studios, which is in the Fryft zone! If you have a passion for radio and podcasting, this class will be the perfect fit for you!

In Summary: Great class and great conversations! Dense readings, but if you’re passionate about the subject, you won’t mind.

6. JOUR: 462: Law of Mass Communication [2 units]

JOUR 462 is a class I have a lot of conflicted feelings about but overall enjoyed. I took this class fall semester of my senior year with adjunct professor Adrienne Jenell Lawrence. I loved learning about media law, and I thought Adrienne was a phenomenal teacher. She knew exactly what information journalists would need to know and made sure to keep all her discussions interesting and pertinent to journalism. I loved going to lecture for this class and enjoyed how many opportunities we had to interact and participate. I was surprised at how fun learning about the law could be. This class is one of the reasons I am considering law school. 

However, this was Adrienne’s first semester teaching, and her expectations for assignments and exams were never conveyed properly. Most students ended up with far lower grades than they expected. Up until the final exam, I loved this class and probably would have rated it higher, but Adrienne as a professor was hard to read and didn’t set expectations properly when it came to grading. 

While it may sound bitter for me to say I didn’t like this class because I got a lower grade than I anticipated, as a class we were confused by the results of our final exam, and the professor failed to give a proper explanation of her grading system even after multiple students asked.

In Summary:  Great class with lots of important content, but miscommunication with professor  led to disappointing grades.

7. JOUR 207: Reporting and Writing I [3 units]

JOUR 207 was an introductory journalism course that I took my first semester as a sophomore with Professor Ron Grover. Ron was an extremely capable and kind professor that has taught me more about journalistic writing than any other professor. This class  was pretty hard though. This was the first time in my life I was reaching out to sources individually and having to manage my time researching and writing articles. While Ron did a great job teaching us the specifics of writing articles,  I don’t think he necessarily equipped us well on how to reach out to sources and where we should start looking. This led to a lot of problems and tension for students when finishing assignments. I took this class during the first semester after COVID which also presented new challenges on interviewing sources. I believe if this course had been updated with a little more structure and consideration for the pandemic, the class would be perfect.  Overall, though, the course provides students with a solid foundation for their future Annenberg classes. 

In Summary: Great class with a great professor, but it lacked structure and needed  more concrete examples on how to reach out to potential sources. 

8. JOUR 322: Introduction to Investigative and Data Journalism [2 units]

 JOUR 322 is a prerequisite course that I took  in my second semester of my junior year with Professor Dana L Chinn. The class itself was pretty straightforward and simple, but it moved quickly, and, therefore, it was hard to retain the information given during lectures. Professor Chinn did a great job in teaching Excel properly in terms of data journalism, but the class only met once a week and was fairly short. It operated with students following what Prof. Chinn was doing on screen, and, if you missed a step, it was hard to catch up. Prof. Chinn was really kind and made sure to address concerns and questions right away in class, but overall, the model of the class made it hard for students to feel comfortable doing the work alone. The class wasn’t very assignment heavy and most assignments were done in class together. However, while that might save your grade, it didn’t lend well to actually learning the material. While the class, in essence, “taught” journalism students how to acquire and organize data, it didn’t necessarily set them up to use those skills on their own. 

In Summary: This class was good overall, but, I don’t think I could actually use much of what I learned outside of class. 

9. ACSJ 200: Navigating Media and News in the Digital Age [4 Units, included a lab]
ASCJ 200 was an intro journalism and communication class that I took online my freshman year. The lecture was led by Professor Gordon Stables, and I took my lab section with Nicholas Alan Morr. I honestly don’t remember much about this class because it was online. The lecture had over a hundred people, and, for the most part, introduced people to the history of news and media. The class went through a lot of basic concepts like objectivity, implicit biases, diversity in the newsroom, and echo chambers that are key for both communication and journalism students to learn. The lectures were long and honestly very boring. The lecture was huge but had a lot of participation, even online. Lab sections, on the other hand, were dedicated to learning Photoshop and other Adobe skills to build upon in the future. The lab sections were helpful for getting one-on-one attention and to learn specific skills. 

In Summary: A very straightforward class, hard to give it a good review due to it being online. 

10. JOUR 201: Culture of Journalism: Past, Present and Future [4 units]

JOUR 201, similar to ASCJ 200, I took it online during my second semester of my freshman year. Professor William Celis taught my section during his last semester teaching. He was a great professor who made the large lecture very engaging and fun. He also made sure to incorporate and highlight marginalized voices in journalism. The class was more so a history class than a hands-on journalism class but did a great job of highlighting how journalism has changed and grown over the years. 

I didn’t retain any information from this class due to it being online and hard to pay attention to for its lengthy run time, but I enjoyed listening to the lecture overall. 

In Summary: Great lecture, but honestly, it was hard to stay focused for that long online. 

11. JOUR 206: Reporting and Writing Practicum [1 unit, 2 Semesters]

JOUR 206 a.k.a the media shifts are prerequisite courses that all second year journalism students must take in order get hands-on experience in a working newsroom. JOUR 206 is taken in two semesters in conjunction with JOUR 207 and 307. One semester is dedicated to print and written articles, while the other is dedicated to working on broadcast and radio. 

Media shifts are notoriously horrible, and most students absolutely dread them because sophomores are thrown into the deep end with little guidance. Left to the editors to assit in publishing the days articles and radio stories, it could often be hard class to manage. In essence, the course is a great hands-on experience, and I do believe I learned a lot, but it was an awful process. Second year students often were left to dawdle around while older and experienced media center leaders were fighting the clock to finish articles on time. 

My main complaint with this “class” was that it had no structure, and it was three and half hours long. Not only that but students were expected to take this class for an ENTIRE YEAR. If these shifts were split in half and happened more than once a week it would be beneficial for both the students and the leaders in the media center. While the course technically has no expectations or assignments, only weighing it as 1 unit is unfair. Students are expected to be on call for almost four hours consecutively and often aren’t allowed to do other assignments during that window. If students aren’t working under a stressful time crunch, they are usually doing nothing at all, and the units do not reflect the amount of time students have to devote each week.

In Summary: The worst ever! Annenberg desperately needs to fix these. 

12. JOUR 307: Reporting and Writing II [3 units]
JOUR 307 by far is the hardest and worst class I have ever taken in Annenberg. This class almost made me drop the major. Professor Lauren Lee White and Professor Christine Kelly lead the section of the class I took. JOUR 307 is dedicated to teaching journalism students how to make multimedia presentations like VSOTS and interview packages in conjunction with written stories. 

While this class goes over a lot of key information and should absolutely be taught, the professors I took made this class awful. They were a mismatched duo and didn’t have any structure for the class. It was obvious each week that both professors didn’t know what to talk about. Not only was the class basically two hours of the professors struggling to teach, they also had unreasonable expectations for students. Worse than that, their standards did not match up with other sections of 307 which created major gaps in expectations based on which professors you got..  

The professors spent the first half of the semester solely on written work and the second half only on broadcast work. No other 307 class was organized this way, and it made the class much harder as we had far more assignments than other classes. Not only did we have more assignments, our professors forced us to pick a beat as a class to base all our stories off. In the end, all students were forced to come up with multiple pitches in fear that other students would have too similar of a pitch for final projects, which ultimately raised the amount of work we did. I have never, to date, done so much work for a journalism class again. 

This class frankly has too many assignments, and it's unreasonable to expect second year journalism students to perform well without giving them a proper structure. 

In Summary: A terrible introduction to broadcast journalism. The curriculum of this class desperately needs to be rewritten. 

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