Be Credible

Reviewed by Mary Jo Shafer, Adjunct instructor, Northern Essex Community College on 6/25/20

Comprehensiveness rating: 5 see less

This book would be appropriate for a journalism course or for any course with a focus on information literacy, including English composition. It seems to be quite comprehensive in its discussion of the various forms of information and how to weigh and determine credibility. I like that it includes different chapters on methods of finding information, including interviews, which is an important in a 100 level journalism course. I find its scope to be quite comprehensive and indepth and it is written in an engaging and easy to understand format. I also like that there are learning objectives listed at the beginning of each chapter and the student generated tutorials on the appendix would also be very useful to share.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

The book appears to be accurate and up to date. Information is presented in a clear and factual manner and it hits on some of the basic fundamental ethics and skills of journalism in an objective and accurate way.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 5

The book includes chapters on google, Wikipedia and other currently popular ways to find information. I could see it being easily updated to add in new trends and popular places readers and researchers find information, while also including information about "traditional" methods, such as interviews. I couldl see a chapter on social media being helpful.

Clarity rating: 5

Yes, I am really impressed with the clarity and accessibility of the prose. This book would be understandable and useful to a beginner journalism student or to a student in any course focused on information literacy. It explains and principles and concepts in an interesting, engaging and easy to understand format.

Consistency rating: 5

Yes, book avoids jargon and jouranalese and presents concepts and principles in an easy to understand framework, even for someone who does not have a background in journalism. Content is also appropriate for students interested in a wide range of communication fields or types of journalism.

Modularity rating: 5

Yes, overall I find the chapters to be manageable and presented in a way that it could be easily reorganized or realigned with various courses. So I could imagine using much of this book in a journalism course but then also using select chapters to talk about information literacy in a composition course.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

Yes, chapter organization and topic development make sense and proceed in a logical and clear fashion.

Interface rating: 5

Content looks clean, clear and easy to navigate. I did not see any interface issues.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

I was impressed with the clear and effective writing and did not see any obvious grammatical or style errors.

Cultural Relevance rating: 5

The examples I looked at were not offensive in any way and I think they lend themselves to being inclusive and understandable to a wide group of students. I liked the example in the News chapter about the police station in Lawrence. This is an example of a possible news story that would easily be translated to our students and would have real world relevance. (Coincidentally we are in Lawrence, Mass., and have a very similar issue with our police station!)

Comments

I am really impressed with this book and am glad to have found it! I am really looking forward to using this with my journalism class in the fall and I also see several chapters that would be very useful to my English composition course. Credibility and information literacy are really important topics for today's students and really for all citizens, so I am glad to see a textbook focused on these important issues that presents them in such a clear and engaging way.

Reviewed by Stephen Siff, Associate Professor, Miami University on 1/27/20

Comprehensiveness rating: 4 see less

Be Credible would be a good companion text to a mid-level undergraduate course on research methods (or "information gathering," as it was called at my institution) for journalists and communication professionals. It covers primarily on-line research and library skills, including lessons on online searching, evaluating articles located online, requesting public records and using local and state databases. Twenty-three short chapters include suggested activities that involve exercising the skills discussed in the text. While thorough in its exploration of online research and factchecking, this book does not cover research methods such as polling or focus groups that may be in a more typical journalism text. Two chapters are devoted to interviewing.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

The book appears accurate and unbiased.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 5

The text seems to be kept updated and the focus on research technique should remain relevant. Examples used within the text seem timeless.

Clarity rating: 5

Very clearly written, with short, well-defined chapters covering a skill ("Keep Detailed Research Notes") or a topic ("Archives").

Consistency rating: 5

Text is internally consistent in terminology and framework. Though from a variety of contributors, chapters are consistent in length and tone.

Modularity rating: 5

The chapters can stand on their own. Instructors might be interested in using chapters devoted to researching a particular topic (like "Nonprofits" or "Public Companies") apart from the more general material on information literacy or journalistic factchecking.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

The organization of the text is clear.

Interface rating: 5

Nice presentation online and in print.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

No errors noted, nicely written throughout.

Cultural Relevance rating: 5

No cultural insensitivity noted. However, all examples in the text and all student testimonials come from University of Kansas.

Comments

This would be a good book to accompany a semester-long research project such as an annotated bibliography. It does not cover how to organize or compose the written report.