All JOU majors are required to submit a professional-level digital portfolio prior to graduation. Evaluation is on a pass-fail basis, and you must pass the portfolio requirement to earn your degree. It is recommended that you seek input from your journalism faculty adviser in the months prior to the posted deadline.

JOU portfolios are managed through a Sharepoint site at https://luky.sharepoint.com/sites/JAMPortfolio. You will be added to access on this site within a week of applying for graduation. If you find you do not have access, you can request it when signing in to the site - please allow 1 workday for this request to be handled.

Video instructions for using the site are here: https://ukci.me/portfoliodirections. If you encounter problems, contact your faculty adviser. Your deadlines are listed below.

Your portfolio will consist of eight pieces plus your resume and a list of your portfolio items. Your portfolio should demonstrate your mastery of the field and demonstrate skills you can bring to the workplace. It will offer the opportunity to showcase your work and meet the accreditation and assessment needs of the school.

It is your responsibility to seek out opportunities to produce professional-quality materials. You should actively seek out opportunities to create these materials through campus media, community media, internships, service-learning, and student organizations, such as the Kentucky Kernel, KRNL Magazine, and WRFL.

When selecting work for your portfolio, it should have been published or otherwise used by an organization. “Published” is defined as being made available to an audience, preferably through curated media, and NOT self-published. Packages that have been broadcast by UKSNN are accepted.

When selecting your eight portfolio pieces, please consult with your faculty adviser about how those should be distributed across categories and mediums.

Here is a checklist to help you complete your portfolio:

• Your portfolio has 10 distinct items.
  • 8 portfolio items
  • 1 Resume
  • 1 List of published work (see below)
• Your portfolio has at least one example of breaking news. Breaking news is defined as a written story or video coverage produced on deadline with a same-day turnaround. Some examples could include sports/game coverage, event coverage, and hard news.
• It has at least one example of a feature. A feature is a typically longer story that, while containing elements of news, aims to humanize, add color, educate, entertain, and illuminate.
• It has examples of published original reporting on a minimum of two platforms: Platforms could include print, broadcast, and online/digital. You should demonstrate your ability to write/publish stories for more than one type of media.
• You have included a document with a list that briefly describes the 8 items you included in your portfolio and where they were published and when. Links are also good to have on this list if available but should not replace a copy of the work submitted to the system.

Broadcast students may NOT use examples of anchoring or radio airchecks. You may include examples of original reporting, like a VO/SOT you shot and edited or a wrap you recorded for a newscast. Students who want to showcase expertise in multimedia, audio, podcasts or video editing, layout and design, photography, or copyediting should consult their advisers in advance of the portfolio deadline to determine how best to incorporate such examples in the portfolio. Compress all videos to mp4 (h.264 or x.264). Convert all print files to .pdfs. No file may be larger than 500 MB.

Review your portfolio with your faculty adviser at each advising appointment. Begin working on your portfolio at least two semesters before you graduate. You may apply to graduate through GPS once you earn 85 hours. See your CI advisers for details. The portfolio must be in progress by the deadline to file your application for a degree as listed on the registrar’s academic calendar. The deadlines for completion correspond to the last date to withdraw.

Once you complete your portfolio, contact your faculty adviser. Your adviser will review the materials and either contact you for revisions or approve it and contact the CI advising office so it can be noted in GPS.

If you plan to graduate in December 2022, the completion deadlines are:
Sept. 21, 2022 - Deadline to open portfolio.
Nov. 1, 2022 - Deadline to complete revisions, contact your adviser for approval.

If you plan to graduate in May 2023 or August 2023, the completion deadlines are:
Jan. 27, 2023 - Deadline to open portfolio
April 1, 2023 - Deadline to complete revisions, contact your adviser for approval.