|
Good timing probably sums up the backstage environment for producing I.Q.’s Haw River special. Director Jim Bramlett had already considered producing a series of shows on North Carolina rivers when he met Blair Pollock, Solid Waste Programs Manager with the town of Chapel Hill, and Jim Sander, an Orange County builder. Pollock and Sander had approached Bramlett with a proposal for a show on the Haw River. For Bramlett, the opportunity marked the perfect time to put together the latest installment of UNC-TV’s science and nature series.
Meanwhile, at UNC-Chapel Hill, Dr. Tom Linden was searching for ideas for assignments for his Medical Journalism class. Since UNC-TV had already recruited Linden’s classes to do features for North Carolina Now, Bramlett seized the opportunity to gather both researchers and writers for the I.Q. special. Linden assigned the production to his class, and the students got to work.
During the spring of 2000, Linden’s students journeyed down the river from its source in Forsyth County to its basin in Jordan Lake, where it meets New Hope Creek. In addition to members of the Haw River Assembly and several wildlife conservationists, the students interviewed the mayors of Reidsville and Cary and residents who live along the Haw River. What they found was a dying river that once was clear and potable to the Sissipahaw Indians who drank out of its streams.
"The Haw is a river that once supported abundant plant and animal life, and from our perspective, it’s dying from misuse and abuse," Linden said.
As associate producers of the special, Linden and his class, Pollock, and Sander conducted the research, initiated the interviews, and did most of the section writing and organizing for the camera shoots. UNC-TV’s Mike O’Connell, who knew the Haw River area intimately, videographed the program. In addition to the program, students in Richard Beckman’s multimedia course in the UNC-CH School of Journalism and Mass Communication created a companion website.
Medical journalism students Lisa Collard, Paul Kendall and Will Spicer served as associate producers. Millie Becker from the School of Public Health and Corey Ford, a former undergraduate with the School of Journalism and assistant producer for PBS’s FRONTLINE series, co-wrote segments for the production.
For Bramlett and Linden, the relationship created a joint resource on which both can rely in the future. "The collaboration between UNC-TV and the UNC School of Journalism has been a very successful one," he said. "They have benefited by having a real broadcast outlet for their class projects. It’s ‘real world’ experience because we require them to do top-level reporting and writing to meet broadcast standards and to adhere to our usually tight schedules and formats. We benefit by getting a program done that might otherwise not be possible because of time and money constraints."
|
