An online home where I write, teach, publish, and explore
By Michael Downing It was a beautiful July morning when drove out of Union City, Pennsylvania, toward Buffalo, New York, across the Peace Bridge, and on to Wayne Gretzky Estate. We visited the Estate last year and enjoyed it very much, sampling whiskey and vodka offerings and dining at the beautiful Trius Restaurant, directly next... Continue Reading →
By Michael Downing Downing, Michael, Travel Writing Slide Show, EAPSU Conference, Millersville, Fall 2024 Downing, Michael, EAPSU Presentation, Fall 2024Download
By Michael Downing I recently published an Open Educational Resource (OER) Journalism book through PA Adopt. 4_5_Downing_JournalismHandbook_PAADOPT PDFDownload 4_5_Downing_JournalismHandbook_PAADOPT WORDDownload
An Open Educational Resource for Journalism Students Michael J. Downing, Ph.D. A Member of The Pennsylvania Alliance for Design of Open Textbooks This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0) as a part of PA-ADOPT, except where otherwise noted. Fifth Edition, 2024. NOTE: I'm conducting an experiment to... Continue Reading →
By Michael Downing DRAFT I was naïve when I got started in the world of academic publishing and didn't know my field would be so territorial--because the people are generally kind—but academic fields are quite territorial. Profs take ownership of their fields and they don’t like it when you come onto their turf; they feel... Continue Reading →
By Michael Downing Edinburgh Edinburgh is magnificent. It was our favorite place on the trip. There is so much to see and do--and so much history. Edinburgh has been the capital of Scotland since 1437 (587+ years) and has been attacked dozens of times since any structure was first established on that titanic rock in... Continue Reading →
By Michael Downing Angus We limped into Oban as a result of the flat tire merit badge we earned making our way from Glasgow up along Loch Lomond. Our tow truck driver was awesome, though. At first, we barely understood him but then, pretty quickly, we were able to dial in. He was going back... Continue Reading →
By Michael Downing A Treacherous Road The road that runs alongside the west bank of Loch Lomond up into the Highlands--called the A82--logs ~170 accidents each year. That's one every two days. In April 2023, a woman and her dog were killed in a collision with a bus and five people were hurt in a... Continue Reading →
By Michael Downing Glasgow We only had about four hours for Glasgow. Headed from Manchester to Oban, we took the Glasgow exit and found a parking garage. Not much time, but we'll find the good stuff. Glasgow was beautiful. We popped out of the mall at the top of the hill where we parked and... Continue Reading →
By Michael Downing Liverpool We hopped the train from Manchester to Liverpool and found ourselves trundling along toward where the mouth of the River Mersey meets the Irish Sea. Liverpool's population as of 2019 was 496,784, making it just a bit smaller than Manchester. It is the fifth largest city in the UK, and part... Continue Reading →
