News Media Coverage of Educational Experts and Research

• In Event: Poster Session 12
  In Poster Session: Education Policy and Politics

Abstract

This study examines what type of educational research and expertise citizens encounter in newspapers, online-only publications such as blogs and the trade publication Education Week. Pursuant to gatekeeping theory, this study also aims to analyze and understand news content by exploring the decision-making processes that journalists undertake before the final product hits the porch step or the Personal Digital Assistant. Findings suggest that journalists often use journalistic norms to select educational research and experts to write about, a process that may or may not net the most rigorous, important or groundbreaking studies or the most knowledgeable experts.

Author

• R. Holly Yettick, University of Colorado - Boulder