Category: Print News

For this story we were provided with data on interfaith marriages from the Pew Research Center. With this information we had to create a story using a focus-on-a-person lead. The challenge was getting interesting quotes and sources that someone would want to read about. After interviewing a lot of different people, I think I succeeded in finding a relatable angle to report on, and a way to humanize the data.

Interfaith Marriages are at an All Time High

Growing up with parents who had two distinctly different religious backgrounds gave Boston-raised Elziana Dos Santos religious acceptance at a young age. Her mother was brought up Jehovah’s Witness, while her father was Catholic. However, when Dos Santos’ parents had children, her mother did not want to raise them in the Jehovah’s Witness religion. Dos Santos was brought up Catholic like her father, but she was also taught about the Jehovah’s Witness faith. Her grandmother, aunts and cousins were Jehovah’s Witnesses. She grew up knowing the beliefs of both religions and while she always attended Sunday mass, she sometimes went to Jehovah’s Witness meetings with her grandmother as well.

Dos Santos’ story is not unusual, however. The number of Americans raised in mixed religious homes is on the rise.

“One-in-five U.S. adults were raised in interfaith homes” according to a study done by the Pew Research Center.

The percentage of adults in America who were raised in mixed religious homes is at an all time high. Rising eight percent from the Baby Boomer generation, the Pew Research Center found that 27 percent of Millennials were raised in interfaith homes. They report that the most common combination is one parent who identifies as Catholic and the other parent as Protestant.

Father Dan Hennessey of Saint Mary’s Parish in Waltham, Mass, said that he frequently sees interfaith couples. Because the Catholic church does not require the non-affiliated party to convert, parishioners have “always [been] accepting” of mixed religious couples, said Hennessey.

Gaby Molinar of Tewksbury, Mass, was raised Presbyterian because of her mother’s faith. While her father was a Baptist, he never fought over how she would be brought up. Since interfaith marriages are nothing new in many Christian churches, both sides of Molinar’s family were accepting of the way she grew up.

Hennessy said that sometimes, when couples decide to get married religion is “not necessarily the first thing” they think about. When two people “fall in love” and “want to be together for the rest of their lives” their first focus is not always religious affiliations.

Many churches offer courses for couples who are preparing for marriage. In the Catholic church it is called Pre-Cana, and one thing it helps to do is settle disputes that may arise among interfaith couples regarding religion. Hennessey said that one of the importances of Pre-Cana is to make sure that the “non-Catholic party [does] not put obstacles in the way” of the Catholic person’s faith. Raising children in the Catholic church and going to mass regularly are common questions that are brought up.

Hennessey said that because “culture is becoming more diverse” interfaith marriages have been on the rise and “religious diversity” is becoming more apparent and accepted.  
The Pew Research center found that “Nearly three-quarters of those raised by parents from different religious backgrounds [said] their parents disagreed little, if at all, about religion.” This can be seen in Dos Santos’ family. She says that “There was never any fighting…each side shared their beliefs with us.”

 

The challenge for this story was to find a newsworthy event happening on campus. This was the easy part. Finding people to interview, and deciding what parts of the event were the most important proved to be quite challenging. In the end, though I am proud of the angles I focused on, and the way that the story turned out.

Student-Run, Jane Austen Ball is a Huge Success

Salve Regina’s second annual Jane Austen Ball brought many new faces as well as returning students, this past Wednesday at Ochre Court.

The Jane Austen ball was hosted by one of the university seminar classes. Students came dressed up in gowns and tuxedos, to enjoy food and refreshments, dance, mingle with friends, win prizes, and witness a traditional Jane Austen dance.

This year’s crowd built on last year’s success said English professor, Dr. Trainor, who ran the event with a class of students. His hopes for the ball were to get people interested in coming and he said that this year they had a “terrific turnout.”

Throughout the dance there was light snacking. Food including finger sandwiches, and small pastries were provided, as well as tea and water for refreshments.

Today’s hit music was playing in one of the ballrooms and students could be found out on the dance floor or exploring the mansion for photo opportunities, while dressed in Jane Austen-esque dresses and suits.

Many students were most excited about being able to show off their formal attire. Freshman Julia Curtin said that she was interested in the event because she “love[s] Jane Austen and any excuse to dress up!” Similarly, freshman, Danny Landino, said “getting dressed up” is what made him want to come.
Publicity for the event stressed the fun of getting to wear old prom dresses and tuxes. Posters like this could be found all over campus.

Freshmen Curtin and Landino said that they knew about the event from these fliers around the school, as well as from upperclassmen who had previously attended.

Landino said that he was “a little upset about the music, but other than that it’s cool.” Because the computer playing the music wouldn’t hook up to the speakers it was hard to hear, but Curtin didn’t mind. She said that she was having a fun time and loved the idea of a Jane Austen themed ball.

The ball began when Trainor started his Jane Austen in Book and Film seminar last year. “Wanting to provide an experiential learning unit” said Trainor, he decided to have the first annual Jane Austen ball last fall. “We have the setting for it, why not do it?” he asked.

His seminar class researched the food, the dancing, and what would typically happen at a ball. The class of 18 were in charge of all the preparation for the event. They were broken up into a food, dance, games, and publicity committee.

The ball reflected the focus of the class because “Of course you can’t pick up a Jane Austen novel without a ball in it” said Trainor.

 

More details on the event here

 

 

This story is based on a set of facts provided to us in class. The challenge was to select the most newsworthy information, organize it following the inverted pyramid model and write an article for print news that adhered to journalistic style. It’s harder than it looks, but I’m pleased with the results.

World’s Oldest Noodles Settles Global Feud

A global feud regarding which culture developed noodles first is settled as a team of scientists discovered 4,000-year-old noodles this month in northwest China.

Houyuan Lu of the Institute of Geology and Geophysics at Beijing’s Chinese Academy of Sciences, along with a group of colleagues, discovered the oldest noodles in an archeological dig at an ancient settlement called Lajia.

Lajia, like Pompeii, is hypothesized to have been suddenly destroyed, but rather by a flood or earthquake.

The bowl of noodles seemed to be preserved by the surrounding clay after it was overturned and became sunk into the clay– protecting the noodles for thousands of years.

The noodles were 20 inches long and made of millet rather than wheat, the most common ingredient in modern noodles.

Lu said, “this is the earliest empirical evidence of noodles ever found. Before this, the earliest record of noodles was in a book written during China’s Han Dynasty sometime between A.D. 25 and 220.”

Archaeochemist, Patrick Mcgovern, said, “if the date for the noodles is correct, the find is quite amazing. This shows a fairly high level of food processing and culinary sophistication.”

The scientific paper describing the team’s discovery can be found in this month’s issue of Nature.

 

*National Geographic covered this story as well. You can find their story here.