APA style is like garlic to vampire journalists who thrive on AP

    APA.

    Those three letters strike fear into many writers who must abide by them when quoting sources. Oh, excuse me, I mean when attributing scholarly citations.

    Adhering to APA style is especially nerve-wracking for journalists. When journalists quote a source who said or wrote something we deem important, for example, we use quotation marks around direct quotes, and then state the person's name and affiliation. That's it. Simple, right? This style of attributing sources is out of the Associated Press (AP) Styleguide, the journalist's Bible for proper spelling, grammar and word usage.

    AP style is in my blood. Journalism DNA flows through me. APA style, on the other hand, is like garlic to a vampire.

    Believe it or not, APA stands for American Psychological Association, and is commonly used to cite sources within the social sciences. Before I actually looked it up to see what it meant, I thought it stood for something like the American Penmanship Assoc. You know, something that had to do with actually writing research papers.

    The psychological word through me off a bit. But I guess it makes sense, since research papers are about studying human behavior, which is part of the social sciences.

    Anyway, I've been sitting on my research paper for about a month. The proposal is nearly finished, and I'm slowing working on the second draft.

    First, I had to take the first person out of the equation. A research paper requires a literature review, which is basically finding scholarly articles written about the topic you are writing about. Instead of saying that I believe it's unfair that students are taught photography by teachers who aren't qualified to teach them, I have to find someone else who believes it too, and then follow the APA style when citing the source.

    Secondly, I have to back up everything I say with another source. This is harder than it seems, considering there aren't many published scholarly articles on the problem of English teachers teaching photography. The upside to my research paper is that I will add such an article to this otherwise anemic topic.

    Lastly, I have to properly cite the multitude of the sources using APA style. Putting the sources in alphabetical order was the easy part. The hard part is formatting the sources according to where you got them, whether it's from a scholarly article, a magazine, a book or online. Each one requires its own special way of handling it. Who made up this stuff?
    I shall overcome the fear because I must. Just writing this post has helped me understand the process a heck of a lot more than I did two months ago. I need to stay focused, and stay away from the garlic.

This is a recent example of me writing my Master's project proposal journalism style, but being told to stick to APA.

  

Overcoming excuses and other reasons for putting IT off

   It’s been a few weeks since I emailed the first draft of my Master’s project proposal to my three committee members at Kent State.

   While I waited for feedback, I updated the syllabus, course policy manual and the first two assignments for the Intro to Photojournalism course I teach at Owens Community College in Toledo. I also created a simple Prezi tutorial.

This is my first Prezi tutorial. I will build on it as ideas come to me.

   Since the prep work for my Intro to PJ class is done, it’s now time to focus on the Master’s project once again. 

   The first draft of the entire paper is due Sept. 15 and I’ve yet to begin editing the proposal paper. But it’s still summer, and I have two kids who need attention, and a full-time job, and I just bought a new RV, and I'm totally into watching Breaking Bad on Netflix! The excuses keep piling up.

   I cannot let those hurdles stop me from getting this done! I’ve worked too hard for five long years. So, every time I feel compelled to delay the inevitable, I remind myself that if I don’t do this now, I will become a statistic. Did you know that lots of grad students don’t graduate because they don’t finish their final Master’s project or thesis? How many you ask? Sorry, but if you want to know a definitive answer, look it up. I don’t have time.

   I don’t want to be a statistic. But more importantly, I want my kids to see me  

walk up on that stage in cap and gown wearing Honors Society cords. They need to witness the final reward of sticking to something you started, and that hard work pays off.

   So after I write this I’m going to watch a few more episodes for Season 2 of Breaking Bad*. After all, next week I will be too busy working on my research paper to watch TV.

*(Update: I'm not proud to report as of Aug. 29, I'm up to Season 5/Espisode 2)