JOURNALISM: HOW DO THE JOURNALISM STUDENTS IN TURKEY EVALUATES THEIR PROFESSION?

Year 2018, Volume: 26 Issue: 2, 56 - 76, 01.06.2018

Funda Erzurum İncilay Cangöz

Abstract

Attempts at professionalizing journalism around the world have led to a veritable boom in the education of journalists at universities. Inspired particularly by the establishment of journalism schools at US universities in the early 20th century, tertiary journalism has swept the globe, prompting some scholars to call the phenomenon a “graduatization of journalism”. It is now increasingly common for journalists to have earned university degrees in journalism. Journalism education is seen as so important because it “perpetuates or modifies professional practices and molds the perceptions journalists have of the role and function of the media” Gaunt, 1992, p. 1 . As a result of the popularity of tertiary journalism education in recent decades, a number of studies have examined the ways in which journalism students see their work and the extent to which university education may account for these worldviews. The professional values and attitudes of journalism can be learned and internalized by journalists by way of living different experiences in a variety of settings and by interacting with multiple sources, including those stemming from professional educational settings Preston, 2008; Shoemaker and Reese, 1996 . It is therefore crucial to investigate the ways in which journalism education influences students’ perceptions of and attitudes to their future profession, as arguably they would carry them into their career as journalists. This study aims to analyze the main debates surrounding the influences on journalism students’ professional views. There are three main influences that have been raised in the literature. This study covers: the role that students’ motivations and career desires play and the effect that journalism schools may have on students’ views as measured by the stage at which students are within a program. Studying these dominant influences on students’ professional views is important in order to provide an empirical base that can better inform journalism education in Turkey. This study therefore examines a sample of 435 journalism students from different years and 8 different Universities’ journalism programs during 2014 and 2015. By this study the students’ opinions about how university education shapes their professional views, as well as the extent to which these views may be similar or different across different schools is asked

Keywords

Turkey, Journalism Education, Ethical Values, Journalism, Motivation, Career Desire.

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