NEWS REPORT
- 185 candidates;
- 140 passed - 74 per cent

The examiners' report:

The September news report focused on the topical subject of child obesity. Candidates were given background notes about a health-conscious school which was inviting parents – and the press – to a meeting where the head teacher would give details of a school initiative to reduce child obesity. The briefing pack also contained national and European statistics.

The main angle came from the head teacher's speech. He/she announced that the school had appointed the county's first Healthy School Coordinator who would be checking pupils' lunch boxes from January 1 and confiscating unsuitable items – chocolate, biscuits, cakes, crisps and fizzy drinks.

The speech contained a selection of strong emotive quotes which candidates were expected to record accurately in their stories.

The general standard was pleasing and considerably higher than in previous news report exams. Candidates, perhaps because the story was a topical one, demonstrated a good understanding of the obesity problem and what the school intended to do to help its 475 pupils.

Shorthand appeared to be more reliable this time, giving candidates the chance to take down their selected quotes with greater accuracy than has been the case in the past. The need to keep one's shorthand speed to at least 100wpm cannot be emphasised too strongly – shorthand is an essential skill of a journalist and needs to be up to speed and accurate.

The majority of candidates handled the story well and are a credit to their newspapers. Those who did not pass the news report let themselves down through inaccuracy and poor story structure.

Accuracy and attention to detail are the hallmarks of a good journalist. There can be no excuse for mis-spelling names that had been given in the background notes. Markers were presented with St Katherine's School, instead of St Katharine's, and Mrs Julie James, instead of Janes. In a surprising number of stories county and country were confused in respect to Mrs Janes' appointment.

Another popular area of confusion was between the National Child Measurement Programme and St Katherine's School Fit for the Future campaign with quotes about the programme being attributed to the campaign. Crisps in one story became "bags of chips” – an interesting item for a school packed lunch! In another story Julie Janes was said to be looking for "contraband”.

Punctuation, particularly the correct use of the apostrophe, was an area of concern.

Story structure was a problem for some who scattered information about and failed to achieve any form of flow to their stories. Most candidates correctly picked the lunch box check angle as their intro, but a few disappointingly buried this in the latter part of their stories.

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