I have also received some feedback on the scope of our objectives (4 in total) being too broad. Comments like "Serving general public, UWCers, parents and donors" at a time may seem to be difficult.
Hence, I suggest the first objective to be the primary objective and the second to fourth objectives to be the secondary objectives.
Primary Objective:
1. To promote a new kind of education (i.e. UWC mission and vision)
Secondary Objectives:
2. To formally record our memories and share to all UWCers & LPCers
3. Generate a profit and donate to LPCUWC for scholarship / project funds
4. Show our UWC sponsors how our alumni are contributing back to society & appeal to potential sponsors
Hence, our main target group will the general public in Hong Kong and those who can read Chinese/English.
Again, we welcome for comments in the coming 2 weeks (14-27 July) in order to make it final.
Jul 14, 2008
More on Language - 2 more weeks for your comments
We continue to receive more comments on our hottest topic - the Use of Language from my year, my second years as well as UWCGO committee. Good to hear some different opinions in order to stimulate our thinking since we never come up with a definite solution during the previous meetingsssss.
Last Saturday I met with the UWCGO committee in LPCUWC for a more detailed discussion. Committee members of our book like Eric Chan and Fiona Chung were also present. Comments from them suggests that pure Chinese is perhaps not the appropriate medium. Bilingual (English + Chinese) or pure English is more preferred. I got similar comments recently from different sources like telephone and this blog.
As said, my primary concern is on the marketing prospective. We have to suit what the readers (general public) and publisher/distributor's wants and needs. I agree with most of you that our readers usually can read both languages. The problem here comes with the publisher/distributor - who are the "middleman". If these people stop us from putting the book on their shelf, our target of "promote the book to the general public" may be affected. If we are to do so, we need to pay double effort to convince them.
In order to understand more about the what publisher/distributor thinks, I called well-known local publishers like Hong Kong Economic Times (經濟日報), Mingpao (明報), Crown (皇冠) and Cosmo (天地) and do a bit of research on their comments on our problems.
Half of them (2) suggested pure Chinese and any half (2) have no definite answers. It is important that all of them said they cannot provide a concrete answer now and can do so only after submitting of the WHOLE draft, which we did not do at the moment.
I am not sure if the above publisher/distributors are pro-Chinese language as most of their books are in Chinese. This may cause a biased result. As I don't have any source and idea for "pro-bilingual" and "pro-English" publisher/distributors, I very much hope that you can give us some idea on these kind of publisher/distributors.
Obviously I do not mean to be against the goal of UWC international understanding by having pure Chinese, as I am one of the UWCers like you! And it does not make sense to "exclude" any group from sharing all our laughter and tears. It is a book for our memories. It is fine for any changes if neccessary.
I suggest we have a 2-week period (14 - 27 July) for more comments on this issue: the use of language. What do you think after reading this post? Bilingual, pure Chinese or pure English? And the reasons? We also welcome those who have commented - you can add more opinions here.
After that, I hope we will have a more concrete answer in order for our editors and journalists to start their work.
Please post your message now!
Last Saturday I met with the UWCGO committee in LPCUWC for a more detailed discussion. Committee members of our book like Eric Chan and Fiona Chung were also present. Comments from them suggests that pure Chinese is perhaps not the appropriate medium. Bilingual (English + Chinese) or pure English is more preferred. I got similar comments recently from different sources like telephone and this blog.
As said, my primary concern is on the marketing prospective. We have to suit what the readers (general public) and publisher/distributor's wants and needs. I agree with most of you that our readers usually can read both languages. The problem here comes with the publisher/distributor - who are the "middleman". If these people stop us from putting the book on their shelf, our target of "promote the book to the general public" may be affected. If we are to do so, we need to pay double effort to convince them.
In order to understand more about the what publisher/distributor thinks, I called well-known local publishers like Hong Kong Economic Times (經濟日報), Mingpao (明報), Crown (皇冠) and Cosmo (天地) and do a bit of research on their comments on our problems.
Half of them (2) suggested pure Chinese and any half (2) have no definite answers. It is important that all of them said they cannot provide a concrete answer now and can do so only after submitting of the WHOLE draft, which we did not do at the moment.
I am not sure if the above publisher/distributors are pro-Chinese language as most of their books are in Chinese. This may cause a biased result. As I don't have any source and idea for "pro-bilingual" and "pro-English" publisher/distributors, I very much hope that you can give us some idea on these kind of publisher/distributors.
Obviously I do not mean to be against the goal of UWC international understanding by having pure Chinese, as I am one of the UWCers like you! And it does not make sense to "exclude" any group from sharing all our laughter and tears. It is a book for our memories. It is fine for any changes if neccessary.
I suggest we have a 2-week period (14 - 27 July) for more comments on this issue: the use of language. What do you think after reading this post? Bilingual, pure Chinese or pure English? And the reasons? We also welcome those who have commented - you can add more opinions here.
After that, I hope we will have a more concrete answer in order for our editors and journalists to start their work.
Please post your message now!
Jun 30, 2008
Final Guideline for writing UWC book article
Final Guideline
1. Suggested format:
i. Interview (written in essay form): you (journalist) interview a selected interviewee (alumni / principals / teachers / students, etc). Suitable for interviewees who need guidance for presenting ideas & who lack time to write articles by himself/herself.
a. Example: http://www.uwc.org/gp_twan
b. You must consider “Tips for your articles” in Point 8 to write your article
ii. Interview (written in dialogue): interviewees & you formulate the content in dialogue format (e.g. Q&A, msn dialogue). A more lively method.
a. Example: Q&A format: http://www.soapsonabc.com/2008/02/02/general-hospital-sarah-brown-q-a-interview/ and MSN dialogue format: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/812079.html
b. You must consider “Tips for your articles” in Point 7 to write your article
iii. Self-written: alumni / principals / teachers / students write the article with guidance from an editor (of our group). Good for those who can present his/her ideas clearly in written form.
a. Example: http://teampyro.blogspot.com/2006/10/let-me-splain-myself.html
b. You must consider “Tips for your articles” in Point 7 to write your article
iv. Round-table interview: a group of interviewees discuss on selected topic(s). Use this method if interviewees’ interaction can produce spackles & inspiring ideas. A moderator is present and you (journalist) should write the article.
a. Example: http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6261414.html
b. You must consider “Tips for your articles” in Point 7 to write your article
2. Method of interview / information exchange: in person / telephone / email / msn…..any kind you (journalist) think is effective
3. Style: No specific requirement. Should be set according to the way the journalist/writer intend to present and the content of the article. Possible styles can be formal, casual, funny or lively
4. Language Medium: Chinese (in Proper/Formal Chinese, no Cantonese please!)
5. Presentation way: Words + Photos
6. No of words: about 2,000 – 2,500 words (Chinese characters with punctuation marks included)
7. No of photos: at least 10 (should be very eye-catching!).
8. Graphic design: You (journalist) DO NOT NEED to do any graphic design of your chapter/article. What you need to do is to submit article + at least 10 photos to our designated designer. However, you can help by matching each photo with corresponding paragraph in your article. Tell the designer your ideas in written form. He/she will help you for the design.
9. Tips for excellent articles
All articles MUST include the following:
i. Creative chapter title
ii. Sub-titles (副題) in between paragraphs
iii. Must-know knowledge (小知識) or Useful tips (小錦囊) like in-depth info, interesting facts, personal insight. E.g. When the article is mentioning about “IB”, we suppose that our readers, who are general public, may not know what it means. So please provide some “must-know knowledge” like a sentence or two about IB and include the official website. Do not put the knowledge in the content but on either left or right hand side of a page, preferably in smaller font.
iv. Figures, tables & charts
v. Interviewees bios (similar to CV but in short form): maximum 10 items (either working experience, educational attainment, award or all of them)
Workflow:
Selection of topics (by journalist)
Develop article framework and interview questions (discussion between journalist and editor)
Interview / self-written stage / round table (by journalist)
Writing + selection of photos (by journalist)
Draft Submission (from journalist to editor)
Feedback for redrafting (from editor to journalist)
Submission to interviewee if necessary (by journalist)
Submission to graphic designer (by journalist) + graphic design (by graphic designers)
Submission to chief editor (by graphic designer)
Publishing
Feedback for redrafting (from editor to journalist)
First draft on 2008.6.25
Updated on 2008.6.30
1. Suggested format:
i. Interview (written in essay form): you (journalist) interview a selected interviewee (alumni / principals / teachers / students, etc). Suitable for interviewees who need guidance for presenting ideas & who lack time to write articles by himself/herself.
a. Example: http://www.uwc.org/gp_twan
b. You must consider “Tips for your articles” in Point 8 to write your article
ii. Interview (written in dialogue): interviewees & you formulate the content in dialogue format (e.g. Q&A, msn dialogue). A more lively method.
a. Example: Q&A format: http://www.soapsonabc.com/2008/02/02/general-hospital-sarah-brown-q-a-interview/ and MSN dialogue format: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/812079.html
b. You must consider “Tips for your articles” in Point 7 to write your article
iii. Self-written: alumni / principals / teachers / students write the article with guidance from an editor (of our group). Good for those who can present his/her ideas clearly in written form.
a. Example: http://teampyro.blogspot.com/2006/10/let-me-splain-myself.html
b. You must consider “Tips for your articles” in Point 7 to write your article
iv. Round-table interview: a group of interviewees discuss on selected topic(s). Use this method if interviewees’ interaction can produce spackles & inspiring ideas. A moderator is present and you (journalist) should write the article.
a. Example: http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6261414.html
b. You must consider “Tips for your articles” in Point 7 to write your article
2. Method of interview / information exchange: in person / telephone / email / msn…..any kind you (journalist) think is effective
3. Style: No specific requirement. Should be set according to the way the journalist/writer intend to present and the content of the article. Possible styles can be formal, casual, funny or lively
4. Language Medium: Chinese (in Proper/Formal Chinese, no Cantonese please!)
5. Presentation way: Words + Photos
6. No of words: about 2,000 – 2,500 words (Chinese characters with punctuation marks included)
7. No of photos: at least 10 (should be very eye-catching!).
8. Graphic design: You (journalist) DO NOT NEED to do any graphic design of your chapter/article. What you need to do is to submit article + at least 10 photos to our designated designer. However, you can help by matching each photo with corresponding paragraph in your article. Tell the designer your ideas in written form. He/she will help you for the design.
9. Tips for excellent articles
All articles MUST include the following:
i. Creative chapter title
ii. Sub-titles (副題) in between paragraphs
iii. Must-know knowledge (小知識) or Useful tips (小錦囊) like in-depth info, interesting facts, personal insight. E.g. When the article is mentioning about “IB”, we suppose that our readers, who are general public, may not know what it means. So please provide some “must-know knowledge” like a sentence or two about IB and include the official website. Do not put the knowledge in the content but on either left or right hand side of a page, preferably in smaller font.
iv. Figures, tables & charts
v. Interviewees bios (similar to CV but in short form): maximum 10 items (either working experience, educational attainment, award or all of them)
Workflow:
Selection of topics (by journalist)
Develop article framework and interview questions (discussion between journalist and editor)
Interview / self-written stage / round table (by journalist)
Writing + selection of photos (by journalist)
Draft Submission (from journalist to editor)
Feedback for redrafting (from editor to journalist)
Submission to interviewee if necessary (by journalist)
Submission to graphic designer (by journalist) + graphic design (by graphic designers)
Submission to chief editor (by graphic designer)
Publishing
Feedback for redrafting (from editor to journalist)
First draft on 2008.6.25
Updated on 2008.6.30
Conclusion on Use of Language
This is James again.
We have had a nice dinner yesterday (29 June 2008) and our group has come to the conclusion about the use of language of our book.
In respond to the need of readers and book disturbutors, we agree to have the book in Chinese.
We are sorry for those who wish to write in English. Please find help from those who can translate. If you find problems on this, please let our committee know. We will try our best to help.
We will consider to have another book in English if resources allow. However, we shall focus on the current book at the moment.
Thanks.
We have had a nice dinner yesterday (29 June 2008) and our group has come to the conclusion about the use of language of our book.
In respond to the need of readers and book disturbutors, we agree to have the book in Chinese.
We are sorry for those who wish to write in English. Please find help from those who can translate. If you find problems on this, please let our committee know. We will try our best to help.
We will consider to have another book in English if resources allow. However, we shall focus on the current book at the moment.
Thanks.
Jun 27, 2008
Pls give your comments: Use of Language - Chinese/English/Bilingual
Hofan has sent me a question about the use of language: Chinese/English/Bilingual.
Actually we have talked about this in our previous meetings. Somehow no conclusion has been come up.
And what I write in the draft guideline in previous post here is "Chinese".
WE got a variation here.
Let me explain the reason I suggest "Chinese". As I have talked to a publisher from Commerical Press (who is Eugenia Lo, also a LPC alumni) and we think that we should somehow fit our readers, i.e. local people.
Well, it is a hard decision (not to have English articles) as we also want to let many cannot-read-Chinese alumni to share the book.
However, it is hard for any bookstores in Hong Kong to put a bilingual book on their bookshelf. It is quite ironic - because of this problem. But somehow it is the norm.
Publishing book nowadays are very easy. Therefore bookshops like Page One or Commercial Press can be very selective on what to put on shelf - in order to maximize their profit.
Engenia also suggests that we can publish our book by "self-finance" mode (自資出版). Or we can only target on "insiders" only, i.e. UWCers, LPCers and parents. But this will neglect the public and sponsors. Hence we have come up with the objectives in the first meeting that we would like to let them know more about UWCs through this book.
Hence I suggest it to be in Chinese only.
Would like to hear from your comments, especially if you can consult someone who is also in the publishing field.
Actually we have talked about this in our previous meetings. Somehow no conclusion has been come up.
And what I write in the draft guideline in previous post here is "Chinese".
WE got a variation here.
Let me explain the reason I suggest "Chinese". As I have talked to a publisher from Commerical Press (who is Eugenia Lo, also a LPC alumni) and we think that we should somehow fit our readers, i.e. local people.
Well, it is a hard decision (not to have English articles) as we also want to let many cannot-read-Chinese alumni to share the book.
However, it is hard for any bookstores in Hong Kong to put a bilingual book on their bookshelf. It is quite ironic - because of this problem. But somehow it is the norm.
Publishing book nowadays are very easy. Therefore bookshops like Page One or Commercial Press can be very selective on what to put on shelf - in order to maximize their profit.
Engenia also suggests that we can publish our book by "self-finance" mode (自資出版). Or we can only target on "insiders" only, i.e. UWCers, LPCers and parents. But this will neglect the public and sponsors. Hence we have come up with the objectives in the first meeting that we would like to let them know more about UWCs through this book.
Hence I suggest it to be in Chinese only.
Would like to hear from your comments, especially if you can consult someone who is also in the publishing field.
Jun 25, 2008
Useful website link
UWC official graduate profile: http://www.uwc.org/profiles
Articles about alumni of various UWCs. Divided according to fields, e.g. medicine, non-profit, science, law, etc
Davis UWC scholarship: http://www.davisuwcscholars.org/html/about-story.html
Scholarship from Mr. Davis, a US donor. The scholarship has offered 1424 scholarships of different UWCs with 88 universities/colleges as the project partners.
Articles about alumni of various UWCs. Divided according to fields, e.g. medicine, non-profit, science, law, etc
Davis UWC scholarship: http://www.davisuwcscholars.org/html/about-story.html
Scholarship from Mr. Davis, a US donor. The scholarship has offered 1424 scholarships of different UWCs with 88 universities/colleges as the project partners.
UWC student magazine: http://www.unitedwords.org/
A newly created online magazine written by current UWC students.
DRAFT ONLY! Guideline for writing UWC book article
DRAFT ONLY!!
In view of some concerns about how to write an article, I (James) have drafted some guidelines for our discussion. Welcome to leave a message here or discuss during our coming meeting.
Guidelines for writing UWC book articles
1. Format:
i. Interview: journalist from our group interviews a selected interviewee (alumni / principals / teachers / students, etc)
ii. Self-written: alumni / principals / teachers / students write the article with guidance from an editor (of our group)
iii. Round-table interview: a group of outstanding interviewees discuss on selected topics. A moderator is present and a journalists should write
2. Style: No specific requirement. Should be set according to the way the journalist/writer intend to present and the content of the article, Possible styles can be formal, casual, funny or lively
3. Language Medium: Chinese (No English)
4. Presentation way: Words + Photos
5. No of words: about 2,000 words
6. No of photos: at least 10 (should be very eye-catching).
7. Other tips for outstanding article
i. Creative chapter title
ii. Sub-titles in between paragraphs
iii. Must-know knowledge (小知識)
iv. Reminder (小提示)
v. Useful tips (小錦囊)
vi. Figures, tables & charts
vii. Interviewees bios (in short form)
Workflow:
Selection of topics (by journalist)
Develop article framework and interview questions (discussion between journalist and editor)
Interview / self-written stage / round table (by journalist)
Writing + selection of photos (by journalist)
Draft Submission (from journalist to editor)
Feedback for redrafting (from editor to journalist)
Submission to interviewee if necessary (by journalist)
Submission to graphic designer (by journalist) + graphic design (by graphic designers)
Submission to chief editor (by graphic designer)
Publishing
Feedback for redrafting (from editor to journalist)
First draft on 2008.6.25
DRAFT ONLY!!
In view of some concerns about how to write an article, I (James) have drafted some guidelines for our discussion. Welcome to leave a message here or discuss during our coming meeting.
Guidelines for writing UWC book articles
1. Format:
i. Interview: journalist from our group interviews a selected interviewee (alumni / principals / teachers / students, etc)
ii. Self-written: alumni / principals / teachers / students write the article with guidance from an editor (of our group)
iii. Round-table interview: a group of outstanding interviewees discuss on selected topics. A moderator is present and a journalists should write
2. Style: No specific requirement. Should be set according to the way the journalist/writer intend to present and the content of the article, Possible styles can be formal, casual, funny or lively
3. Language Medium: Chinese (No English)
4. Presentation way: Words + Photos
5. No of words: about 2,000 words
6. No of photos: at least 10 (should be very eye-catching).
7. Other tips for outstanding article
i. Creative chapter title
ii. Sub-titles in between paragraphs
iii. Must-know knowledge (小知識)
iv. Reminder (小提示)
v. Useful tips (小錦囊)
vi. Figures, tables & charts
vii. Interviewees bios (in short form)
Workflow:
Selection of topics (by journalist)
Develop article framework and interview questions (discussion between journalist and editor)
Interview / self-written stage / round table (by journalist)
Writing + selection of photos (by journalist)
Draft Submission (from journalist to editor)
Feedback for redrafting (from editor to journalist)
Submission to interviewee if necessary (by journalist)
Submission to graphic designer (by journalist) + graphic design (by graphic designers)
Submission to chief editor (by graphic designer)
Publishing
Feedback for redrafting (from editor to journalist)
First draft on 2008.6.25
DRAFT ONLY!!
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