UP Radio Circle's Elevate 10 Part 2 discusses Broadening Sports and Feature Writing

Danielle Margareth Piler & John Paul Vidal

SUNDAY, November 21, 2021 - The University of the Philippines’s Radio Circle launched the second part for Elevate 10: Versatility Amid Diversity, with a back-to-back discussion on Sports Writing (10 AM to 12 NN) and Feature Writing (2 PM to 4 PM), held in a Zoom conference. The said workshop was filled with promising writers and aspiring practitioners from different school publications.

Ms. Bea, the webinar host, briefly reminded the attendees with regards to the webinar guidelines. She then warmly welcomed Ms. Luisa Morales, a UP-Diliman Graduate of Bachelor of Arts in Journalism and a content creator at PhilStar, for the first topic, which is Sports Writing.

The program began as Ms. Luisa defined what Sports Writing is all about. According to their presentation, Sports Writing is more like an unfolding story — characterized by non-stop action and movement, portraying a game as a battle. In addition to this, Sports Writing doesn't specialize in the field of sporting events. Thus, it also focuses on persons/athletes and various issues circulating the Sports Industry.

"Unlike news, mas malaya ang isang writer na makapagsulat in terms of Sports Writing," they highlighted, indicating that it has greater freedom of style, as it also combines various writing styles like news, features, and editorials.

They, too, shared the only goal of writing recaps or game stories: Make the reader “see” the Game. Likewise, Ms. Luisa emphasized the importance of "Show don't tell" in writing a sports article. Just telling the readers how the game happened may bore them; therefore, a writer should use actions and vivid descriptions to show how it was executed instead of delivering simple reports.

Continuing to their lecture, Ms. Luisa gave out three (3) things to achieve a good sports article:

1. Focus on "how," not "who." Since final scores are so easy to search on the internet, a writer should tell the readers the story of HOW a team won or lost.

2. Highlight important points. Insert turning points of the match, best players, significant events, and such.

3. Do additional work to improve. A writer may include context, as well as interviews with relevant people or athletes.

Ms. Luisa then delivered three (3) things on what makes a good sports journalist. The first one is to have basic journalistic skills. The second is to be interested in sports events and enjoy them and Lastly, to understand rules, regulations especially sports jargon.

For the participants to better understand sports writing, Ms. Luisa presented some articles written by her to serve as an example. Later, they talked about the three (3) types of sports stories: (1) Straight lead story, primarily used in breaking news for sports, (2) Sports Feature/Athlete Profile, which gives a human face to the game/sport, and (3) Opinion piece, which explores some topics like specific issues in the Sports Industry.

To close their lecture, Ms. Luisa then shared some tips and advice in writing sports articles:

1. Use action words

2. Use synonyms

3. Play with team names

4. Use quotable quotes

5. When using figures, the winning team always comes first

6. Provide more information when naming players

7. Be careful of adjectives

8. Do not be too much of a fan

As soon as their discussion ended, the floor was opened for the participant to ask, and she responded to many concerns to enlighten their curiosity and confusion. The speaker, Ms. Luisa Morales, was then granted a certificate of appreciation, which Ms. Bea delivered.

Moving on with the second topic, the webinar host, Mr. Jomar Cacal, welcomed Mr. John Roniel Canimo, a Writer-Director of DepEd Central Office, the author of Mga Tala at Tula, and the founder of Bulacan State University Journalism Society.

He began his talk by presenting a series of visuals and questions that grabbed the audience's interest and attracted their curiosity as they progressed through several phases of topics on which they could write an article. After that, Mr. Ron elaborated on the difference between various types of writing from feature writing. Writers would be able to distinguish the purpose of other types of writing from feature writing.

Mr. Ron explained the importance of Feature Writing: how people can write and what they should write inside an article. He also stated that an individual couldn't become a perfect writer without going through any hardships or mistakes — practice and hard work are what they need to become a proper and good writer.

As his lecture neared its end, he presented one of the few works that touched his heart when he was only starting his writing career and explained how it was such a fine work that writers should strive to create. He also cleared the misconceptions within feature writing and presented advice on how to write an article that fits what is acceptable and touching to the readers.

Later, the presenter allowed the guests to ask Mr. Ron any questions they had, which he answered and clarified. To end the second segment of Elevate 10, Mr. Jomar then presented the speaker with a certificate of gratitude.

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