Abdulrasaq Kamaldeen reports
The News Digest press, Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto (UDUS), has organized a training session for its members on the Art of News Reporting
The event, held at the A37 lecture room, saw enthusiastic participants from both the existing and the newly inducted members of the pressboard.
Facilitated by Abdullateef Abdullahi, the Editor-in-chief (EIC), the training delved into the basic elements and steps constituting impactful reporting within and beyond the campus milieu.
He emphasized, “ The elements of a news reporting consists of headline, byline, lead, body, and quotation. Also, a compelling headline must not contain the article a, an, and the’, and conjunction ‘and’ should be substituted with a comma.
“Every initial letter of the open class words should be in uppercase, while the closed class words should be in lowercase and avoid the use of a full stop at the end of the headline.”
While explaining further, he differentiated between a Memorandum and a Circular “ A memo is targeted to addressing a particular set of people which can be people of a particular department or faculty while circular is used to address a wide audience like the case of press release addressing both the students and staff.”
He also added that ‘Lead’ refers to the opening section of news reporting while “Body” talks about the whole content of a report which comprises five “W’s and H,” which are: Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How.
In an interview with Muhammed Akindele, a 300-level law student and one of the board members, he noted how excited he was about the training session.
“Honestly, all my expectations were met. I’m glad that I attended this training because I’ve never been taught all the rudiments of news reporting before. I’m very happy about the training.”
Another participant, Akaje Maimunat, a 400-level student of English and Literary Studies and also a member of the pressboard on her part, said: “ The academy was educative and enlightening though I’m not new in the system but I still learn new things in News Reporting and use of different styles while reporting.”