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| Photo Credit: Buffalo State Communication Department / Facebook |
COVID-19 has impacted everyone, but those in the media field face an additional challenge: technology.
“The biggest problem we have in media production is that we’re not able to hand out the equipment to everybody we’d like to,” said Meg Knowles, an associate professor of media production at the State University of New York at Buffalo State College Department of Communication. “In advanced classes they’re borrowing cameras, but in a class like basic production, where normally you’d be using cameras and recording equipment from our department, we’re not doing that this year.”
All of the Communication 312 Basic Media Production classes are 100 percent online, which means that the students are “either dependent on a camera they may happen to have or using an app like FiLMiC pro.”
“Learning the technology aspect of journalism is harder because I can no longer conveniently go to classmates or teachers for tips and warnings about assignments,” said Moises Rijo, a junior and media production major at SUNY Buffalo State. “I would ask others about their experiences working on their assignments before or after class once I’ve got the teachers’ input about how I should do my own. Now, that process is skewed and out of whack since we only ‘meet’ virtually & virtually disappear right after class is over.”
However, despite the additional obstacle of doing film projects remotely, Rijo said that he’s adapting quite well and actually enjoys it.
“So far, most of my classes have had less than 20 students, and the teachers I’ve had have contributed to an environment where I feel most welcome to participate, debate and share my experiences and thoughts with the class,” he stated.
What he misses most, however, are having in-person guest speakers of professionals in the field of television and media.
“The meat and bones of those experiences are the questions I ask them during and after class about the experiences, wisdom, cautions and tales of the television and media world, something I’m just not getting the same level of satisfaction for in the age of remote-learning,” Rijo said.
He argues that the best preparation for media students is to not only get advice from professors with prior experience, but also someone who is currently experiencing the field “in order to help contextualize and modernize” students’ expectations of what is to come in.
“Our upcoming ‘Meet the Professionals’ event is actually being planned for April 15,” Knowles said. “There will be 3-5 professionals in each field of public relation and advertising, media production and journalism where students will have the opportunity to meet with them in very small group breakout rooms to get advice and make connections.”
Despite the struggles of online-learning, Knowles calls the remote desktop a “godsend.”
“The fact that we can let you remote into our lab, that’s like a miracle,” she said gratefully.
Remote desktop access was not always available to media students and was initially only for faculty use. It was not until last fall, according to Knowles, that students were able to use it.
What can media students do to survive this extra obstacle of learning the technological aspect of media production?
“Keep at it, do your best and ask lots of questions,” Knowles advised. “Students have to be proactive in reaching out to their faculty members for help, and that’s the thing that’s going to help them out the most.”
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