Mizzou question ...

Fetch me a beer, ya newbie.

 

I'm also not Greg's mom, but I'll second that. He's been a great editor and mentor to me. I don't think I'll ever forget something he told us at the Missourian, "I've got an idea, lets write stories that people want to read." Simple, yet very powerful and smart.

 

i think it's fair to say greg is to college journalism what renfro was to acting.

 

I am in the j-school right now and am graduating in May. Right now, the GPA requirement is a 3.0. If you have high tests scores on the ACT or SAT coming out (I think a 30 on the ACT) you can get automatic entrance into the school but you have to wait until your junior year to enter your sequence.

I didn't have a 3.0 but I appealed and got in based on my extra-curricular activities and an intership. As long as you do what you are supposed to do and fufill requirements, you should get in. Once you get into the Missourian, it is competitive because you are trying to distinguish yourself from other writers and get good clips. But that is no different than any other daily.

Hope that helps out.

 

The Missourian operates like a daily, sure--but there are several things about it (and maybe some of the current students and even the editor can chime in to tell if it's the same way) that are unlike lots of regular dailies, at least ones I've read. When I was a student, the paper set aside a ton of space for big, long stories, and there were a lot of us who were attempting them. I say "attempt" because, at that point, we were still in school, and some of these narratives were what writer-friendly editors call "glorious failures"; parts of them were good, but parts were way out there, and overwritten. It was a way to grow, to try that kind of writing, but none of us got chewed out for writing in second person or having a long sentence or for doing something not considered straightforward. It was a place to try, is what I'm saying. The editor was a different Greg, who sounds like he liked the same stories the current editor does. I went to magazines after I graduated, because that was my ambition--but when I interned at a big daily, there wasn't a lot of room for "glorious failures," if you know what I'm saying. A lot of great major papers run ambitious pieces, but I don't know if they have the same type of crazy freedoms.

 

that was the longest paragraph i've ever read.

 

Every glossy spotted pebble that exits the ass end of that University turns gold....

Whitlock and his Mizzou-RAH friends took a photo together at the Missouri-Kansas game last year....

It was a most glorious time....

You should -- no you could -- and should have been there.... by might and dint of your studies....

 

I'm not still there, but am a recent grad. I'll say that it is a place to try things and experiment. The Missourian, and J-school in general are eager to try and experiment with new ideas and technologies to stay at the cutting edge of journalism.
When I was there Greg and Grant Hodder, the ASE, allowed longer features, but I don't think they were ever "glorious failures." I turned in some insanely long features and Greg would kindly ask if I would like to chop 20 (or more) inches off the story, or if I should have him do it.

 

An update: My mentee got rejected from Florida and wait-listed at Syracuse, but even if he had gotten in I'm not sure he would have been able to turn down the package he's being offered at Missouri, which is half of all his tuition. Combined with other grants an scholarships, it looks like he will be able to get out of college debt-free and even get a small refund check every semester.

 

Wow, congrats to him.

 

Well, fuck Florida and Syracuse.

 

That too.