{"id":11465,"date":"2026-07-21T20:19:53","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T01:19:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/?p=11465"},"modified":"2026-08-03T23:38:39","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T04:38:39","slug":"a-noteworthy-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/07\/a-noteworthy-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"A noteworthy experience"},"content":{"rendered":"

As a lecture began in Fisk Hall, some students flipped open notebooks while others turned on laptops. Arden Li of Highland Park, New Jersey, placed their small red journal and bright pink felt pen on their desk. Li said taking handwritten notes helps them remember the content better.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m proactively considering what I\u2019m writing down and taking in,\u201d Li said. \u201cIt also helps me filter out the key points and mental landmarks.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Charlie Tobin of Menlo Park, California, also takes physical notes because he said it connects his brain more and eliminates digital distractions.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Typing her notes on Google Docs, Alice Xiao of Beijing said digital note-taking is more convenient and easier to read.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPhysical notes seem disorganized and harder to edit,\u201d Xiao said. \u201cSo far I have accumulated 29 Google Docs. I\u2019m definitely going to bring all these notes back to my school newspaper, and since a lot of people can\u2019t read my handwriting, these should be easy to understand and apply.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Instructor Peter Slevin said he prefers handwritten notes but allows his students to choose what works best for them.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI recommend having no computers open in cherub sessions unless they\u2019re necessary for an exercise,\u201d Slevin said. \u201cMy advice for students during lectures is simple and old fashioned: Avoid looking at laptops and phones, concentrate on what is being said and speak up.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Though preferred note-taking methods differ, cherubs\u2019 reactions to the program\u2019s engaging and informative lectures often overlap.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Li said they learned a lot and enjoyed being surrounded by people who share a similar enthusiasm for journalism.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAll the lectures were engaging and thoughtfully articulated, which made for good notes,\u201d Li said. \u201cBut it was also interesting to see how the instructors were truly passionate to be here and teach the next generation.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Tobin said he appreciated all the advice and wisdom instructors had to offer.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe people talking to you are some of the best in their field,\u201d Tobin said. \u201cIt\u2019s really incredible that we get to learn from them for an hour and a half. Some lectures that were great were John Kupetz\u2019s, Bret Begun\u2019s and Cynthia Wang\u2019s.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Whether taking hand-written or typed notes, cherubs absorbed insightful information during lectures.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":297,"featured_media":11705,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[663],"class_list":["post-11465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics"],"acf":[],"authors":[{"term_id":663,"user_id":297,"is_guest":0,"slug":"emchan26","display_name":"Emmeline Chan","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f37b6a78508769426234376f5a8eb33304831c446e21dcff5a12647e98f32b2?s=96&d=mm&r=g","author_category":"","user_url":"","last_name":"Chan","first_name":"Emmeline","job_title":"","description":""}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11465","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/297"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11465"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11465\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13084,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11465\/revisions\/13084"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11465"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=11465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}