The class meets

Our course began today and I was delighted to see most of you in the classroom, even some who have internships that we feared might prevent you from attending. Anyone who can't attend a class due to an internship can do it online, but it's always best to be there if you can.

We had a great discussion about the RNC Convention that's coming up next week and some of the meetings of delegate committees already underway, such as those working on the platform and others working on the rules. Some are attempting a Dump Trump move, using the rules, that should be exciting, whether or not it succeeds.

We also discussed how media cover election campaigns and why, as well as the benefits and drawbacks for democracy of the current state of flux in the country's news media. While traditional media -- which we talked most about today -- are struggling, new media are filling some of the gaps in coverage left by staff cuts and declining advertising revenues that leave old media short of money to support the best journalism.

And we had an introduction to the politics of political conventions from Colin Swearingen, the political science professor who is teaching the course with me. This is very interesting to me, as I'm Canadian and did all my journalism there, so I haven't covered a U.S. political convention. The idea of a "contested convention" is not new to me because Canadian conventions are always contested. We don't have primaries the way the U.S. does. I do understand why the primaries were opened to the public in the 1970s, but I always like the drama of a convention where the outcome is unknown. This is one of those, despite the fact that Donald Trump has enough delegates committed to vote him in as the nominee on the first ballot. That's because the aforementioned Dump Trump movement is trying to free up enough of those delegates from their commitment to Trump (by changing the rules) to make that first ballot less certain. We'll see what happens on Thursday and Friday!

I'm truly enjoying sharing this experience with students and also the fact we have several types of majors in our course -- mostly communication and political science, but we also have a graduate student and an adjunct professor whose PhD is in history. And the political science expertise of Dr. Swearingen. I have already learned some new things about how conventions here work and the political forces behind them.

I'm also enjoying reading the introductory blogs by our students, getting to know them a bit and learn about the volunteer experiences and internships many of them are doing. It's going to be fun, sharing their experiences through their blogs and the class discussions.

See you tomorrow!