Notes about the beat notes

By now, I have met with most of you about your beat notes. These are a critical tool for a journalist setting out to learn a new community. When you turn in your notes at the end of the semester, your beat notes will reflect how well you have learned this community of Ithaca.

In broad strokes, Ithaca is described as a hippie town or as a college town. The phrase I’ve often heard is “Ten square miles, surrounded by reality.”

There is much truth to that, but what I’ve tried to get across in our individual sessions is that the complexity of a community can’t be expressed in a bumper sticker.

So, in developing your beat notes, I’m asking that you work beyond the stories that you might have in front of you, to look for people to talk to who will help you understand the city and community of Ithaca and what makes it tick.

Everyone in this class needs to make an effort to get off campus and meet contacts who will help them understand the city more. If you are limited by a lack of transportation, my advice is to get out and ride the TCAT around the city. Don’t take it just to get to a destination. Ride it to get an overview and understanding of what the city is about. Look around and ask yourself: “Why is that like that?”

Then, can you find the people who can answer the question?

Above all -- BE CURIOUS!

Talk to the people on the bus. Find a conversation starter and start asking questions about what Ithaca is about. You’ll find there are people out there who live large parts of their lives without even thinking about the colleges or the hippie community.

Now, for the women in the class, you should exercise some caution. Unfortunately, the world is a more dangerous place for a woman than a man. My wife, who teaches self-defense for women, has explained that to me. You need to develop your instincts for danger. But at the same time, to function as a journalist, you need to get out and meet people. So, I would recommend a book called “The Gift of Fear” by Gavin DeBecker. Actually, both men and women need to read this book. More thoughts.

The book is very helpful for journalists and writers because it teaches you about reading body language and other cues that can give you insight into what someone is about to do. Noticing and gathering those details can also enrich your writing.

But, getting back to the beat notes, I would encourage that with everyone you talk to for the rest of this semester, try to find opportunities to ask about Ithaca. What do they think of it? What are the major issues in town? Then are there other people who would know more about those issues who you should talk to? Find an opportunity to ask about this in each interview, if that is practical.

By doing this, you should come up with excellent ideas for final projects.

But ultimately, you will develop the skills needed to learn a community.

This had been my strategy when I set out to cover Burbank, Calif., for the Los Angeles Times. I filled sheets of paper with typewritten and handwritten notes as I drove around the city, making contacts. (Later, I put them all in a computer file.) But I knew I had done enough when I started getting the same names recommended to me. I still kept collecting contacts, but by then I knew the major players, and I knew who I needed to call when a story broke. I also knew who I needed to call to check in with on a regular basis.

Later, I also covered parts of the east San Fernando Valley, and the heavily Latino populations there. I used the same strategy, and I also reached a moment when I knew I had worked the beat effectively.

I received a letter at the L.A. Times that told me how accepted I had become in this community. Not that acceptance is what you drive for as a journalist. Your goal is not to make everyone like you. (That typically fails, anyway.) You want to maintain a professional, respectful relationship with your sources. However, this letter let me know what this source thought of me. But it was not what was in the letter, actually. It was what was on the envelope.

It was addressed to “Ed Bondilla.”

“Wow! I’ve made it,” I said to myself.