Journalists and journalism students will be the first to tell you that math isn’t really their strongest skill.

“Exactly,”said Leigh Ann Hornick, a West Virginia University P.I. Reed School of Journalism graduate student.”I just think that journalism students have a tendency to be frightened of math. I know for myself math isn’t my strongest skill, and throughout high school and college I’ve focused more on journalism and English classes.”

But thanks to the WVU Department of Statistics, journalism students will now take a special statistics class designed to help them understand the types of statistical analysis they’ll have to do when they graduate and get their first job.

Starting in fall 2005, journalism students, who are required to take Statistics 111, will now be directed to a specific section designed for journalism students and will no longer be allowed to sign up for any other section. The class is designed to make statistics more relevant to journalism students, who will need to understand certain statistical principles on the job.

“Journalists tend to be afraid of numbers, but they need to know certain fundamentals, such as how to interpret polls, budgets and research data,”said SOJ acting Dean Maryanne Reed.”They need to be better informed about what numbers mean, so that they can report on the impact of those numbers on the lives of their readers and viewers.”

Not understanding statistics can lead to fatal errors, such as when the news media called the 2000 election early for Gore, Reed said.

Joan Gorham, associate dean in the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences, freed up a statistics instructor to design the course and to teach it. And E. James Harner, department chairman, worked with the school to design the course.

Gorham said that Statistics 111 is less about learning how to do statistics and more about interpreting statistics, a necessary skill for journalists. Gorham said that regardless of what journalism students see themselves doing after graduationinvestigative journalism, on-air broadcasting, public relations or advertisingthere is a certain amount of interpretation that all journalists have to do.

“Sometimes if you can make the examples something students know, they say,’yeah, I get it,’”she said.”We’re trying to use examples that might zing a little bit more for them.”