Classes & Workshops

The Bass Lab offers classes for USC Annenberg students, and workshops for Bass Fellows and the general public. To register for our Fall 2023 Second Draft Project class (JOUR 499), you must first apply. Please email the following in a single Microsoft Word document by July 28, 2023:

  • A cover letter, stating what you hope to learn about using artificial intelligence as a journalistic tool;

  • A resume;

  • Three pieces of work that showcase your multimedia skills. (If this work is video or audio, or exists on GitHub, include links in the Word document.)

  • A list of at least three references; two of whom must be USC professors. Provide email addresses for each person.

To be notified when other workshops become available, sign up below for our Bass Lab newsletter.

  • The Second Draft Project is an immersive journalism production class, which deploys artificial intelligence (AI) to build empathy in news audiences. The course challenges students to explore what the news media may have missed the first time around, and teaches them how to highlight new voices from old news narratives. Students will work in teams to research some of history’s most misrepresented, maligned or marginalized news story subjects. Then students will interview them a second time, on camera, to create an AI-powered video chatbot that can answer questions about its time in the public eye. If the original story subject is no longer living, students will interview their close connections and loved ones for insight into how a media frenzy may have affected the entire community.

  • Check out our complete syllabus for the new Second Draft Project class.

  • How to apply the concept of reparative journalism to create opportunities for the news industry to atone.

    How to practice advanced newsgathering techniques to offer fresh story angles on previously reported events and people.

    How to use multimedia storytelling formats – such as interactive interviews, podcasting and extended reality – to immerse news audiences into a story.

  • A “mind map” that identifies someone who deserves a second draft, and builds out a universe of voices around them to help retell their story.

    A case study that evaluates how the news media previously covered our Second Draft subject.

    A collection of 75 questions for our AI-powered video chatbot story subject.

    A longform, Second Draft Project podcast episode.

    An accompanying work of photogrammetry, virtual reality or augmented reality, which provides an immersive scene from the story.

  • The Bass Lab’s Founding Director, Dr. Allissa Richardson, is the lead journalism instructor for this class. GRX Immersive Labs and the USC Digital Repository will provide lessons on ethical AI media production.