This document provides a reporting primer with guidance on writing ledes, nut grafs, and story format. It discusses including news values in ledes to grab attention and explaining "why readers should care" in nut grafs. Nut grafs should tell the story and its impact. The document also reviews maintaining balance of perspectives, using an inverted pyramid structure, and ending stories with a summarizing quote rather than opinion. Formatting guidance demonstrates using a statement, evidence, and quote structure and checking grades and club participation.

1. REPORTING PRIMER
DR. JENNIFER COX

2. DATA STORIES
• Check your CMAT club participation!

3. LEDES
• Be clear
• Be concise
• Get people interested
• Introduce the news values

4. NUT GRAFS
• Mainly necessary if you use a feature lede
• If you use a summary lede, make sure you explain the “why
should I care” up high in the story
• Tell me what this story is about
• Tell me why I should care
• What is the impact?
• Numbers often equal impact
• The storm damage cost residents $40,000.
• Use specific information
• Marry the rest of the story to the nut graf for better
organization

5. NUT GRAFS

6. BASIC WRITING HINTS
• Don’t begin sentences with days/dates
• Use one or the other!
• Maintain balance – represent both sides in the lede/nut graf &
beyond
• Inverted pyramid – most to least important
• Numbers = impact
• Conflict? Oddity?
• Work in your news values up high!
• Remove the words “however” and “very” from your writing
• Story organization: statement-evidence-quote

7. STORY FORMAT
Board member Jill Thomas introduced the
proposal to ban weapons on college
Statement:
campuses.
Thomas argued weapons have no place
on campus. She pointed to recent
Evidence:shootings as patterns of violence
increasing at universities causing students
to feel unsafe.
“We need to do better for our students,”
Thomas said. “We need to make sure they
Quote:feel they can learn in a safe, secure
environment.”

8. STORY FORMAT
Some staff members feel diversity on
campus has improved, but there is still much
Statement:
work to be done.
Physics Professor Mary Smith is the only
Evidence:African American in her department. Smith
said she would like to see more professors
of color in the hard sciences.
“Students need a diversity of viewpoints, even
in concrete areas like science,” Thomas said.
Quote:“Because of my cultural background, I bring a
different perspective to the table.”

9. IN CLOSING…
• DO NOT end with a “moral of the story”
• DO NOT end with your opinion on the subject
• DO NOT end with an essay conclusion
• DO end with a quote that summarizes the main
points of the story
• DO end with where people can go to find more
information

10. IN-CLASS EDITING WORKSHOP
• Get at least two people to look over your paper
• I want to see:
• Lede
• Nut graf
• Lede quote
• Get rubrics filled out from each partner

11. ANNOUNCEMENTS
• Grades will be up-to-date after tomorrow afternoon
• Data story and last participation quarter
• Check your club participation, and let me know if I missed
anyone
• Final presentations Wednesday, 4 p.m., TE 219 –
• No PowerPoints
• Bring snacks to share, if you want
• Quick presentations, then class wrap-up discussion