Student Resumes: Get With It

From Paul Conley:

Perhaps the strangest thing I've run into is what I've come to think of as the silo student. Kids keep handing me resumes that look like they were written 20 years ago. They mention the student newspaper, the yearbook and the college literary magazine. But they don't mention Web sites, blogs, email newsletters, podcasts, html skills, citizen journalism projects, video, etc. And when I ask the students about their online experience, I get these weird responses. Lots of them tell me "I only want to work for a newspaper." Lots of them say things like "I'm going to be a writer, not anything else." Some seem genuinely perplexed and ask me if I think "most newspapers have Web sites?" or if "reporters need to do things on the Web?"

When I asked teachers what they thought about this, I found that they were as upset as I was by their students' disconnect from the realities of media today.

Jeff Jarvis comments:

I have been arguing that people in newsrooms must tear up their business cards, getting rid of their job descriptions as print or broadcast or new media. All media are new today. Conley makes it apparent that the same thing must happen in schools; we have to tear up the tracks.