Missouri Journalism school is Apple's dreamland

Seth Weintraub
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May 09, 2009
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The University of Missouri Journalism School, which you might remember from the below picture last year showing a pretty high percentage of Mac usage, is taking the Apple love one step further.  They are now requiring incoming students  to have iPhones or iPod touches.  According to the Missourian, Brian Brooks, associate dean of the Journalism School, thinks the entertainment device can also be a learning device:

“Lectures are the worst possible learning format,” Brooks said. “There’s been some research done that shows if a student can hear that lecture a second time, they retain three times as much of that lecture.”

Freshmen admitted into the School of Journalism and pre-journalism students will be sent a letter notifying them of the change. Students may buy either an iPod touch or iPhone in order to meet the new requirement.

While it is technically a requirement, the mandate isn't going to be enforced.  Students could purchase a Zune or use their laptops to play back lectures if they want to, but judging by the picture above, that isn't likely.

“The reason we put required on it is to help the students on financial need,” Brooks said. “If it’s required, it can be included in your financial need estimate. If we had not required it, they wouldn’t be able to do that.”

The project will use iTunesU to gather and distribute lectures to students.

This summer, Brooks said, the entire MU campus is installing a program called Tegrity which will allow the recording of lectures. Lectures can later be downloaded to media players through iTunes U which offers free content hosted by universities.

Brooks said MU is following other schools such as Stanford and Abilene Christian University in the use of this technology. The success of the new program will be evaluated at the end of the year, at which time Brooks said the program will be changed or scrapped.

“I anticipate it doing very well because it has proven to be very valuable to other universities,” he said.

(via Macworld)

Comments (29)

TMobMan (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 9:26am

How stupid. There could never be some other motivation going on here now could there?

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 1:24pm

I think it's very sad that Methzoo has to make the iPod touch and iPhone a requirement for journalism majors so the students will have 1 good thing to say they got out of that sad and desolate university ;)

Rock Chalk Jayhawk KKKKKUUUUUUU!!!!

ulfoaf | May 09, 2009 - 2:30pm

Repeating this over and over just makes you look "douchy."

It is really hard to say something good about MU, but that is pretty cool. I need to get back in perspective...

A guy wearing a Texas Longhorns jacket walked into a bar in Columbia. The bartender glared at him and said "You ain't from Missourah, where you from?" The guy says "Texas." the bartender says "what do you do down there?" The guys says "I'm a taxidermist." The bartender asks "Whut's that?" The guy says, "Well, I mount animals." The bartender lets out a whoop and says "Don't worry boys, he's one of us!"

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 4:26pm

Well maybe they'll start teaching neo-nazism soon like they do over in Kansas.

ulfoaf | May 09, 2009 - 10:33pm

Something about the Aryan Nation saying they were going to headquarter in KC? They didn't, apparently. People who live in glass states shouldn't throw rocks .... "Mo neo-nazi group joins the adopt a highway program Jan 22 2009" http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,481709,00.html

Now, if you were trying to insult Kansas, you should have mentioned Fred Phelps. We have the dubious pleasure of calling that nut a native and a resident.

Eric (not verified) | May 11, 2009 - 9:14am

Typical talk from a Jayhawk. I had to threaten to tear the beak off the Jayhawk because he kept getting in my way shooting at the big 8 tournament game in Colombia when we creamed the KU team. I see they haven't gotten over it yet.

In case anyone didn't notice, there is no penalty for not getting an iPhone or an iPod Touch. The article certainly would have had a more accurate article if they had pointed that out.

ulfoaf | May 11, 2009 - 3:25pm

There has not been a "Big 8 Tournament Game" in Columbia in at least 26 years. Actually we've been too busy polishing our NC trophies to remember ...

They last time we played in basketball, it was about a 30 point ass whipping MU got in Lawrence in early March.

Eric (not verified) | May 11, 2009 - 9:14am

Typical talk from a Jayhawk. I had to threaten to tear the beak off the Jayhawk because he kept getting in my way shooting at the big 8 tournament game in Colombia when we creamed the KU team. I see they haven't gotten over it yet.

In case anyone didn't notice, there is no penalty for not getting an iPhone or an iPod Touch. The article certainly would have had a more accurate article if they had pointed that out.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 4:49pm

I doubt it. Let me tell you what the motivation is. The iPod is by far the most dominant player on the market. The university wants the pick the most popular platform so they don't have to spend a ton of money distributing these lectures across multiple platforms. Therefore, they picked the one that the most students are already likely to have. The picture with all of the students using Mac notebooks seems to reinforce the fact that students there obviously prefer Apple products.

I'd imagine they'll probably offer iPods to those few that don't have them at a very substantial discount with no profit going into the school's pocket. In fact, they may even be picking up part of the cost and taking a small loss. It's extremely unlikely that there's any sort of behind the scenes deal making going on between the University of Missouri and Apple.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 1:22pm

I think it's very sad that Methzoo has to make the iPod touch and iPhone a requirement for journalism majors so the students will have 1 good thing to say they got out of that sad and desolate university ;)

Rock Chalk Jayhawk KKKKKUUUUUUU!!!!

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 1:23pm

I think it's very sad that Methzoo has to make the iPod touch and iPhone a requirement for journalism majors so the students will have 1 good thing to say they got out of that sad and desolate university ;)

Rock Chalk Jayhawk KKKKKUUUUUUU!!!!

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 1:24pm

I think it's very sad that Methzoo has to make the iPod touch and iPhone a requirement for journalism majors so the students will have 1 good thing to say they got out of that sad and desolate university ;)

Rock Chalk Jayhawk KKKKKUUUUUUU!!!!

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 1:24pm

I think it's very sad that Methzoo has to make the iPod touch and iPhone a requirement for journalism majors so the students will have 1 good thing to say they got out of that sad and desolate university ;)

Rock Chalk Jayhawk KKKKKUUUUUUU!!!!

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 1:24pm

I think it's very sad that Methzoo has to make the iPod touch and iPhone a requirement for journalism majors so the students will have 1 good thing to say they got out of that sad and desolate university ;)

Rock Chalk Jayhawk KKKKKUUUUUUU!!!!

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 1:25pm

I think it's very sad that Methzoo has to make the iPod touch and iPhone a requirement for journalism majors so the students will have 1 good thing to say they got out of that sad and desolate university ;)

Rock Chalk Jayhawk KKKKKUUUUUUU!!!!

KU & MU = P.U. (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 4:32pm

I saw that picture in an e-mail at least a year ago, if not two.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 4:34pm

I don't think you read the article.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 4:34pm

Leave it to some dumb hick from Kansas to use an Apple news outlet as a platform to post their childish and completely irrelevant trash on. I guess that really says a lot about what comes out of their university doesn't it?

ulfoaf | May 11, 2009 - 3:36pm

Ha! The KU people are poking fun, but we see who gets nasty.  How can a hillbilly call someone a hick?

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 4:47pm

As a student at Mizzou, I can tell you that the Apple brand is everywhere on campus. With a student body of 29,000... seventy-five percent of them are Mac users, many of them with iPod touches or iPhones. The J-school on campus is 99% Macs (the other 1% are all outcasts). The school has its own Apple Authorized Store that's based on the look of Apple's own retail stores, handling sales and repairs. Every computer lab and public computer on campus is a Mac, installed with Boot Camp for the 25% of PC losers on campus.

Needless to say, it's pretty awesome.

P.S. Down with KU :)

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 4:52pm

Now if only apple would design a program for schools to use that works with mac/windows as well as iPod touch/iphone. Pretty much something like blackboard that actually works. Blackboard is okay only because the alternative is pretty much nothing.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 09, 2009 - 5:12pm

Your right, he has just given great proof of the caliber of student that they are kicking out of there. I'm glad I went where I did. Thanks for the insight.

Oh and getting back to the real point of posting about this article, I think it's cool, no matter how small it may be, or how little interest I may have in this particular university. Anyone who is doing their best to improve the learning experience with the technology at hand is doing the right thing. More places ought to be taking similar steps to take education to the next level. I wish the university I attended had offered something similar.

Michael (not verified) | May 10, 2009 - 12:31am

As a former campus rep for Apple (and graduating senior in 6 days) from Mizzou, I would like to say that Brian Brooks is a very forward thinking man who would never make such a decision if he felt it was forced upon the students.

The fact of the matter is that most incoming students get a free ipod when they purchase the laptop (which has been required since 2005). Its a program that has been in place the last 4 summers without fail. Corporate always said the free ipod is not guaranteed to happen every summer, but its been a pretty solid pattern so far.

I briefly had an iPod touch while I worked for the company as a loaner and it was fantastic having wifi all over campus- i did download podcasts and having email with me all the time was awesome. I'm not sure how people claim its a conflict of interest when its not REALLY required, and Apple isn't profiting on the ipods due to the rebates anyway. In fact i always thought it was stupid of the moms and dads dropping 1200 on a new laptop to ignore a free ipod they could easily craigslist or ebay and make back 200 bucks all because they didn't wanna fill out a simple form.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 10, 2009 - 5:49pm

Since when is the profession "Journalism" a major from our institutions of higher learning?

It is apparent with todays quote journalists unquote that there is little need for the requirement of a degree. Not with the slop out there today that passes as reporting!

terry (not verified) | May 11, 2009 - 12:48pm

I understand how you might be frustrated--whether you're a centrist appalled by Fox, or a righty offended by CNN. But historically there's more effort to be objective in the media today than 100 and 200 years ago. And you have to be careful to distinguish between news and analysis--read the WSJ, for example, and reporters will give you one version of the news, and the ed and op-ed pages will then put a quite different spin on matters. Or watch Lou Dobbs on CNN, and imagine how the reporters would be rolling over in their graves--in fact, it's easy to imagine they were WISHING they were dead--when he twists their efforts at objectivity to suit his perceptions, and they have to grin and bear it. Being a good news consumer DOES require some user skills, no doubt about it. Of course, studying all these things, and--for those in the news curricula, being graded for objectivity--is what justifies the course of study as a major.

ulfoaf | May 11, 2009 - 3:38pm

There is is a whole world out there of which you are apparently completely unaware.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | May 11, 2009 - 3:44am

How sad and misunderstood. They encourage sharing content, but at the cost of vendor lock-in.

thekingofhxc (not verified) | May 11, 2009 - 5:27am

Full Sail University gives macbook pro's to all students. It's called the launch box program

fullsail.edu

Vaganza (not verified) | May 11, 2009 - 8:44am

Wow..old picture