The job hunt begins, and I’m offering a cash bounty

Greeting, friends. Eleven months ago, I left Florida to come to Chicago and work my way through Northwestern’s Master’s of Journalism program.  Since then, I have been gainfully unemployed, focusing all my attention on my studies. This year-long project has been a success thus far.  I’m now in my fourth quarter, and the end is … Read more

Whoa, has it been nearly a month?

Once again, it looks like I’ve been neglecting the occasional update for you lovely folks.  Let me give you the quick rundown of what’s going on. I’m knee-deep and wading through this obituaries project.  The interactive innovation project at Medill this quarter is about obituaries, online and off.  That’s eating up a metric ton of … Read more

It’s now Autumn, and quarter 4 of grad school

So today was my first day of my last quarter of studies at Northwestern. It seems that I’m going to be thinking intimately about obituaries for the next ten to twelve weeks. It also is creeping up on time for me to start looking for work.  Can’t support this lifestyle with no income, so it’s … Read more

Nano-writing technique leaves a very small impression

In April, scientists from Northwestern University published a new technique for drawing nano-scale structures on a surface, using an atomic force microscope.  In this video, the authors of the paper demonstrate and explain the technique and some of it’s potential applications. [podcast format=”video”]http://www.ianmonroe.com/flash_video/NANOFAB.flv[/podcast] Note: This story was first published on the Medill Reports website, on 5/14/2009. … Read more

New quarter, new beat

Starting today until the beginning of June, I’m working on Health/Science reporting. My beat is Technology/Gadgets/Nanotech. If you should happen to have any good tips on these subjects, please please contact me and clue me in (ian at ianmonroe.com). I finally have a beat that I can write about with some kind of clarity, so … Read more

Lawrence Lessig at the Kellogg School of Management

Yesterday, Lawrence Lessig spoke at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern. Lessig is like the Elvis Presley of the nerd universe; a rock star of the highest order. I don’t need to run down his resume… if you’re reading this, chances are you’ve heard of Lessig before.  You probably know that we have him … Read more

Want to know the main problem with trying to do grad-school journalism?

Here’s the thing — journalism is transactional.  You rely on other people to feed you information that you can use to write your stories.  In exchange, your sources get to draw attention to the things that they think are important. For instance, if you’re writing an article about a new business, you contact the business … Read more