Sept. 11 is Jim Roeder’s favorite day to teach his broadcast courses at Columbus East High School.
Not because it’s a fun class, he said, but because he gets to teach students about what the media does and what the media did in response to the horrific events that unfolded in New York City, Washington D.C. and Shanksville, Pennsylvania, on that day in 2001.
“To me, this is the most defining moment in media history,” Roeder told his students Wednesday. “It’s certainly the most defining moment in the way the media understands its audience.”
Roeder created a special lesson plan ahead of the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks to teach students about the media’s role in reporting the story as it happened, second-by-second. In a 29-minute video, Roeder syncs up five major news outlets’ coverage with one another on one screen to show how each outlet — NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN and FOX — covered the event.
“This video is a lot to digest,” Roeder said.
For more on this story, see Friday’s Republic.
