Style Guide for The Stewardship Report

T his style guide deals with the ways The Stewardship Report content is presented to the reader

The vast majority of news sources rely upon a stylebook , a collection of agreed-upon guidelines for writing style. A stylebook helps writers and editors by providing a standardized way of writing. Stylebooks help ensure consistency in such things as headlines, abbreviations, numbers, punctuation and courtesy titles. Stylebooks therefore are helpful.

A news style is developed with emphasis on efficient, and accurate imparting of information about events; and so following our news style suggestions should have the additional benefit of helping you get off the ground writing effectively, if you are a new writer.

The Stewardship Report style is aimed to allow quick understanding and more informative, of The Stewardship Report articles by the majority of readers, but nothing here is compulsory.

Status. The Stewardship Report Stylebook, like all style guides at working news organizations, is a work in progress and is subject to change as new issues emerge and the language of news coverage evolves.

Conventions. Elements of punctuation and grammar are not addressed by exactly the same terms universally. There is no intention to be regionalist in this manual; however, in the interests of causing the least confusion, the following terms are used for clarity:

Period : This American term is used to describe full-stops (the British/International term) wherever they might be used.

Basic News Writing

Six tips on better writing. In the 1946 essay Politics and the English Language , author George Orwell devised 6 easy tips to make anyone a better writer. To paraphrase him, they are:

Never use the passive voice when you can use the active.

Shorter is better in sentences and paragraphs. If you can cut a word from a sentence, cut it.

Shorter is better in word choice. Never use a long word when a short one will do.

Do not confuse your reader with uncommon words. Never use foreign phrases, scientific jargon, or high-tech buzzwords if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

Never use clichés metaphors, similes, or other figures of speech that you are used to seeing in print. Be original.

Be polite — even when you disagree. Break any of the above rules before you write anything offensive or outrageous. Avoid personal attacks, do not exaggerate the situation, and do not use sarcasm or hyperbole . Otherwise, you risk losing credibility in the eye of the reader.

Headlines. When naming your article, keep the following points in mind. (Most of them apply also to the body of the article, and are covered in greater detail further down this page.)

Make them unique and specific — Due to the way the software of The Stewardship Report works, each headline must be unique; choose specific details which describe this unique news event.

Make them short — Headlines are as short as possible.

Use verbs — A headline is at its essence a sentence without ending punctuation , and sentences have verbs .

Use "upstyle" capitalization . “Upstyle" headlines, all nouns and most other words with more than four letters are capitalized. “Downstyle” capitalization is the preferred style. Only the initial word and proper nouns are capitalized.

“Upstyle” – Powell to Lead U.S. Delegation to Asian Tsunami Region.

“Downstyle” – Powell to lead U.S. delegation to Asian tsunami region.

Write in a neutral point of view — headlines should not be biased in tone or word choice.

Tell the most important and unique thing — Article titles should consist of a descriptive and enduring headline. As a series of stories on a topic develop, each headline should convey the most important and unique thing about the story at that time.

For example, ‘ Los Angeles bank robbed ’ is an unenduring headline because there will likely be another bank robbery in Los Angeles at some point. Instead, find the unique angle about the story you are writing and mention that: ‘ Thieves commit largest bank robbery in Los Angeles history ’ , or ‘ Trio robs Los Angeles bank, escapes on motorcycles ’ , or even ‘ Trio commits largest bank robbery in Los Angeles history, flees on motorcycles .’

Use present tense — Headlines (article titles) should be written with verbs in present tense.

Use active voice - News is about events, and generally you should center on the doers, and what they are doing, in your sentence structure. Active voice is ‘ Leader goes to shops ’ whereas passive voice, to be avoided, would be ‘ Shops visited by leader .’

A quick check is try to word your sentences to avoid verbs ending in ‘- ing ’ and look for ‘ be verbs ’ , e.g. ‘ are going to ’ can easily be converted to ‘ will ’ or simply ‘ to ’ . Rather than ‘ More criminals are going to face execution in 2005, ’ if we put ‘ More criminals to face execution in 2005 ’ or ‘ More criminals face execution in 2005 ’ a better sense of immediacy is conveyed.

Try to attribute any action to someone — ‘ Insurgents shoot U.S. troops in North Baghdad ’ is better than ‘ U.S. troops shot in North Baghdad .’

Avoid jargon and meaningless acronyms — Avoid uncommon technical terms, and when referring to a country or organization, use its full name rather than acronym, unless the acronym is more common than the full name (ex: NASA, CIA, AIDS) or length is prohibitive.

Use comma, not ‘ and ’ or ‘ & ’ — Often the word ‘ and ’ may be substituted with a comma ‘ , ’ . Example: ‘ Powell and Annan set international goals for aid ’ could be written: ‘ Powell, Annan set international goals for aid ’

Using the Dateline Templates. Articles must include the dateline (place) as the first two words of the article. These words are presented in bold, italics. In journalism, the location in the dateline may either refer to the location of where the article was filed from or where the event happened even if the writer was not physically present.

The First Paragraph. The first paragraph (known as the intro or lead) should summarize the article in around 50 - 80 words, using one to three sentences. Try to answer the questions of who, what, where, when, why and how . Try to fit most of these into the first paragraph. This is known as the ‘ five W ’ s (and an H) ‘ , and is the first thing to learn about News writing.

Don ’ t feel stifled by this suggestion. Those experienced in reporting learn to determine which of those six questions are the most relevant to the story (and, more importantly, the reader).

If you don ’ t have the answer to one or two of them, skip it - but explain why you don ’ t know later in your story.

Don ’ t make your first paragraph a boring list of facts – it ’ s the first thing the reader sees, so make it interesting.

Every fact or issue mentioned in the first paragraph should be later backed up or expanded in the main body of the article. This goes hand-in-hand with the very brief mention of facts in the first paragraph - you needn ’ t explain everything fully in the intro, but what is mentioned should be fully explained before the reader finishes reading the article.

Do not feel compelled to finish the story completely yourself, but do try to avoid misleading or mystifying the reader. We can ’ t help you write the story if we can ’ t understand it.

Article Length. Most complete articles should have at least three paragraphs. Don ’ t post articles containing only a link to a story on an external news site and no story text. Such pages are quickly deleted.

Writing Tone and Structure. Write to be easily understood, to make reading easier. Beyond the first paragraph, try to stick to the following tips:

Use brief paragraphs - between 30 and 80 words is considered acceptable in newspaper writing

Each paragraph should be only one or two sentences (three if you use very short sentences)

Each paragraph covers a single topic only

concentrate on the new facts and their known or potential consequence - keep to bare minimum all background and plot details (aka exposition )

most important and newsworthy facts first , with least important and least immediate facts last - this is opposite to development order in typical narratives, and is termed inverted-pyramid style

Use plain English

Use punchy, active language to intone a sense of immediacy

Be balanced

Be clear, concise and unambiguous

Promote the human aspects of any story, using quotes etc - this makes the story interesting to a wider range of people

If you find your work is too wordy, try juggling word order, squeezing out unnecessary words. You may be surprised how many you can find! And it gets easier with practice. The reason for inverted-pyramid style is twofold: One reason is to help the reader, who is usually in a hurry when reading news. Putting the important and new aspects first helps since they may skip the story after only a couple of paragraphs.

Attribution. Every factual claim made needs to be attributed within the story text so the reader knows where it is coming from, except for anything which can be considered common knowledge. It is to be assumed that from the point where a given source is attributed, onwards, all facts mentioned emanate from that source, or are common knowledge, until another attribution is made or the end of a paragraph is reached.

Attribution is in addition to citation of references (see below), and attributions should be readable without interrupting the flow of the text. Attributions usually happen at the end of a sentence; e.g., ‘ The car was at the top, ’ said Doyle. ‘ It fell over the cliff and burst into flames, ’ according to Miller. Doyle said there had been five people on board.

Verb Tense. Articles should be written in the past tense or the present perfect . Headlines should be written in the present tense. Timelines also are written in the present tense.

Reporting on Future Events. Since we as writers are not in the business of predicting the future and are not psychic (arguably), it is best to stick to past or present perfect tense - especially since future events may change (or be cancelled). When writing about future or ongoing events, change tense as follows:

They will meet next Tuesday - change to: They are scheduled to meet next Tuesday or They said they would meet next Tuesday

The event will continue through the end of August - change to The event is scheduled to continue through August or The event is supposed to continue through August .

The show debuts in July 2012 or The show will open in July 2012 - Change to The show’s debut is scheduled for July 2012 or something similar.

The couple will celebrate their third anniversary next month - change to The couple plan to celebrate their third anniversary next month.

Citing your References. Articles may include a variety links and citations. They generally fall into four categories: other The Stewardship Report articles, external links to online sources, printed reference citations, and websites with background or related information. Each category can have its own section, but there should be a distinction at least between links to factual support and links to background websites. Usually the category sections would be Related news , Sources , and External links

Documents used as source material in the story need to be cited. This is to acknowledge prior art, so that information can be evaluated and verified by readers, and just as a general benefit to the reader. A citation should provide the author, date, publication and title of a source for information in the story.

Sources Section. Sources include online articles and, for original reporting , reporter ’ s notes. Online articles may change, move, or be deleted, unlike References .

Linking Sources. Use links to online sources, and include important relevant information about the source The important information when citing a source includes the author of the article (a person or organization), the title of the source, who it is published by, and when it was published.

Detailed Style Issues

Abbreviations. Abbreviations and contractions are handled differently by different dialects of English, and there is no set rule regarding them other than to be consistent throughout the article, and the original contributor ’ s style choice is preferred. Acronyms and abbreviations should always be explained on or prior to first usage. For example, if a story relies on several points from the Associated Press then the first usage would be ‘Associated Press (AP)’ and subsequent to that the abbreviation ‘A.P.’ could be used.

United States = U.S.

United Kingdom = U.K.

United Nations = U.N.

Spelling. Spelling is an issue which often becomes contentious since there are multiple contradictory standards available, for example, British English, Australian English and American English. On The Stewardship Report there is no specific policy other than to use a consistent spelling pattern throughout an article. Follow the spelling patterns of the subject of the article or that of the first author of the article to avoid issues.

Numbers. Generally, small whole numbers - 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 are spelled out in long form: zero, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine and ten. Where numbers are in the ‘ teens ’ it is generally preferred that the number be spelled out, but above that, actual digits, like 42, should be used. Where you start moving into the very large territory and are citing numbers such as 10,000,000 you should use the more verbal form of ‘ ten million .’ Common sense should be applied here along with consideration that our material is in print. Where you can use words as opposed to numbers you should, but not in cases where you would be writing ‘ one hundred and forty-two ’ over 142. The preference for enunciated numbers is intended to apply to round figures where you might say something like ‘ it ’ s over nine thousand ’ in preference to ‘ it ’ s over 9,000 .’ The use of words takes away any ambiguity and is more readable.

Sequential numbers. Numbers indicating sequence follow the primary guideline for other numbers. Spell out first through tenth, but use numerals beginning at 11th and continuing through 23rd to 251st and beyond. Again apply common sense for large round numbers such as 1,000th being written as thousandth.

Note: See how twenty-third is written ‘23 rd ,’ not as ‘23d.’\

Decimal fractions. Either a comma or a point is acceptable, e.g. 1,5 is the same as 1.5; however, in English the latter is the more common and readily understandable format. Exercise caution in choice of format to avoid 1.509 being mistaken for one thousand five hundred and nine.

Large numbers. The decimal can be used to spell out large fractional numbers such as one and one-half million to be ‘ 1.5 million ’ instead of ‘ 1,500,000 ’ or ‘ 1 500 000 .’ In UK and United States commas are used as thousand separators and points are used as decimal separators. In other regions (e.g. South Africa) a space is used as a thousands separator and the comma is used as the decimal separator. Either is appropriate, but use first the style used in the region written about, second the style of the original author. Avoid use of the Indian numbering system words lakh and crore ; these are ambiguous and not understandable to a universal audience.

Currency Codes. It is best to avoid regional lingo or specialized monetary or financial jargon that is not in common, everyday use among the international readers of The Stewardship Report , such as ‘ bucks, ’ ‘ kiwi ’ or ‘ quid .’ Currency codes as listed in the ISO 4217 standard, are unique 3-letter codes that identify all internationally known currencies. While technically accurate, they may not be readily identifiable by most readers. For this reason, it may be best to spell out the name of the currency rather than relying upon the ISO currency code. This allows maximum understanding for the maximum number of readers.

Currency Symbols. There are a few currency symbols that are understood by most English-readers.

$ - dollar

£ - pound

€ - euro

¥ - yen

However, they are not always unique identifiers for a particular currency. Also, there are many other less well-known currency signs . To aid the reader, all monetary denominations not listed above should be spelled out ( ‘ 130.50 Swedish krona’ ) or prefixed with a currency code ( ‘ SEK 130.50 ’ ) instead of using a symbol.

For the euro and the yen , you may freely use the symbol, instead of using a code. But for the $ (dollar) and £ (pound), further clarification may be necessary. Please read below.

$ - Use of the dollar symbol

For dollars, only the ‘ $ ’ is used. Please do not use the cent symbol (¢).

One dollar and twenty-five cents should be written as: ‘ $1.25 ’

Twenty-five cents should be written as: ‘ $0.25 ’ and not ‘ 25¢ ’

Since the United States , Canada , Australia , New Zealand and many other countries all use dollars, it is important to label the type of dollar referenced. Pay particular attention to this because many newswires may report amounts in United States dollars, even if the local currency is different.

Sample dollar notation is as follows:

Australia ‘ A$ 1.25 ’ or ‘ AUD 1.25 ’

Canada ‘ C$ 1.25 ’ or ‘ CAD 1.25 ’

New Zealand ‘ NZ$ 1.25 ’ or ‘ NZD 1.25 ’

United States ‘ US$ 1.25 ’ or ‘ USD 1.25 ’

£ - Use of the pound symbol. There are a number of countries whose currency is the pound . Among those, only the pound sterling (GBP), the currency of the United Kingdom and Crown dependencies , is consistently associated with pound sign (£). Occasionally, it is used to refer to the Egyptian pound , but here LE or EGP are more common. Therefore, amounts in pound sterling, can be referred to using only the ‘ £ ’ symbol.

If you cannot find this symbol on your keyboard, you may either use the HTML code: £ or the words ‘ pound ’ or ‘ pounds ’ instead of the symbol. However, you should be able to find the character in the character insert box below the edit box.

One pound, twenty-five is written as: £ 1.25 or GBP 1.25

Twenty-five pence is written as: £ 0.25 or GBP 0.25, do not use the notation ‘ p ’

Therefore, there is no need to further distinguish the pound sterling (GBP) from other forms of currency. It is assumed that when ‘ pound ’ or the pound sign (£) are used, the amounts are in GBP unless otherwise noted. Keep in mind that ‘ ‚¤ ’ is considered an obsolete version of ‘ £ .’

€ - Use of the euro symbol. The euro is the common currency for a number of European countries. To denote euro, only the euro sign (€), EUR, or the word ‘ euro ’ is needed. Do not use the cent symbol. If you cannot find the euro symbol on your keyboard, you may either use the HTML code: € or the word ‘ euro ’ after the number figure instead of the symbol. You should also be able to find ‘ € ’ in the character insert box below the edit box. Note, the plural of ‘ euro ’ is officially ‘ euro;’ while the pluralization ‘ euros ’ is commonly found, it is inaccurate.

Two euro and twenty-five cent is written as: €2.25 or EUR 2.25

Twenty-five euro cent is written as: €0.25 or EUR 0.25; avoid reference to euro cent.

Date and time. When referencing when something happened or when something is scheduled to happen, use the following formats:

Days. If something happened or is happening on the day you are writing your article, state it is happening today. T his gives the story immediacy. If it happened the day before, say yesterday. If something will happen the next day, say tomorrow. For example:

Tropical Storm Gonu headed toward Iran today, after lashing Oman yesterday with high winds and torrential rains. The storm is expected to continue losing strength by tomorrow.

Beyond yesterday, today and tomorrow, state the name of the day of the week, if it ’ s within seven days. Beyond seven days, state the actual date. For example, if you ’ re writing a story that is filed on a Friday (in this case June 8, 2007), it goes like this:

Space Shuttle Atlantis lifted off from Kennedy Space Center today, and will orbit the earth tomorrow before arriving at the International Space Station on Sunday. Atlantis is scheduled to return to Kennedy Space Center on June 19.

Dates. The Stewardship Report style is to list the month, followed by the day of the month, optionally followed by the year. Single-digit days of the month should not be prefixed by a zero. Thus, for example:

May. 11

May 11

May 2010

May 11, 2010

Do not use ‘ rd, ’ ‘ nd, ’ ‘ st ’ or ‘ th ,' in a date. Years, when present, must be separated from the date with a comma unless only month and year is specified.

Month abbreviation. Months are to be spelled out unless grouped with a specific numerical date:

Jan. for January

Feb. for February

Mar. for March

Apr. for April

May (no abbreviation)

June (no abbreviation)

July (no abbreviation)

Aug. for August

Sept. for September

Oct. for October

Nov. for November

Dec. for December

Month/year constructions. No comma is needed in a month-and-year construction. A comma is needed between the date and the year and after the year in a specific date construction.

The Santa incident occurred in December 2004 in the newly renovated community building.

The Santa incident occurred Dec. 25, 2004, in the newly renovated community building.

Time. Time should be written in 12-hour form only. When using the 12-hour format, morning hours before noon and after midnight are designated as ‘ am ’ - both lowercase without periods; hours after noon and before midnight are ‘ pm. ’ Again, lowercase without periods.

Names of people and organizations. On the first mention of a person in a story, write the person ’ s organization, title, and full name. Try to include a local link or Wikipedia link to their organization and name. Many politicians have local categories and main namespace redirects, e.g. George W. Bush .

When asked his opinion, American Association of Puppy Lovers President John Doe said puppies were fun and cute.

On subsequent mentions, mention only the person ’ s significant name without it being a wikilink. For western names this is the last name, many Asian countries use the first name for subsequent mentions.

Puppies should be treated with respect and well-groomed, Doe added.

If this person has not been mentioned for a few paragraphs, use a shortened title on the next use to remind the reader.

Thaksin Skinawatra was the founder of Shin Corporation . In December 1994, Thaksin became Thailand ’ s Foreign Minister.

When a person is first mentioned as the source of a quote. When dealing with cited quotes, a different rule applies. Here, the order of importance (and order of referral) is as follows: ‘ Quoted text, ’ Full name, Organization (title), said. After that the same rules as above apply. An example:

‘ Puppies are fun and cute, ’ John Doe , American Association of Puppy Lovers president, said.

On subsequent mentions, mention only the person ’ s last name without it being a wikilink.

Puppies should be treated with respect and well-groomed, Doe added.

If this person has not been mentioned for a few paragraphs, use a shortened title on the next use to remind the reader.

AAPL President Doe later responded by…

People ’ s titles in general. Here, again there is a difference between British and American traditions. Either tradition is acceptable, but whatever system is adopted for an individual article, it should be consistent throughout the story For titles other than Mr., Ms., Mrs., Dr., please spell the title in full on the first mention, although subsequent mentions may be abbreviated.

When a person has a title, general rules for capitalization are:

If the title is part of the name (listed before the name), it is capitalized. Example: Governor Jane Smith of Milliana.

If the title is descriptive, listed after their name, it is lowercase. Example: Jane Smith, governor of Milliana.

The Stewardship Report honors the protocol common in the country of origin of the royalty mentioned.

British : royalty and anointed positions: use title plus first name, e.g. ‘ Lady Catherine ’ , ‘ Prince Charles ’

Acronyms instead of full names

On the first mention of a body with a proper acronym or contraction , use a Wikipedia-linked full name. If you wish to use an acronym later in the article, then place the acronym to be used parenthesis directly after the first mention, where the full name is used.

The European Union (E.U.) decided Tuesday that…

Thereafter, use its appropriate acronym/contraction without a wikilink. Full capitalization of acronyms is standard.

E.U. President José Manuel Barroso said…

Names of Publications and Articles. Please italicize names of publications and articles mentioned, including web site names. Don ’ t put web addresses into articles.

When the publication is something like The Boston Globe , note that ‘ The ’ is capitalized.

When using a common, shortened form, such as calling The Boston Globe simply the Globe .

Always use the full name of the publication on the first mention, not a contracted name. Unlike with acronyms, there is no need to explicitly define the contracted form in brackets after the first mention of the full name.

Wiki Links within an Article. Do not over-wikify articles. Link only particularly relevant background material. If your article is about a high-speed chase and accident, the make and color of the vehicle is probably not particularly relevant, but the city or region might be.

Locations, Geography. Make links for regions and countries to The Stewardship Report region or country, not to the Wikipedia articles for same. The Stewardship Report readers ’ primary interest is in further news, and should be directed to other news articles rather than non-news technical information unless it is particularly relevant to the news story . In situations where the Wikipedia information is necessary for clarity, try to link to both Wikipedia and The Stewardship Report pages. For example:

Japan ’ s parliament, the Diet , requested…

Dates. Do not link to dates on Wikipedia. If you choose to link to a date on The Stewardship Report , link either to the date archive or to the date category.

Appositives. Appositives are words (usually nouns with modifiers) that explain or identify the nouns they are placed next to. For example, consider this sentence, where the appositive is italicized: That dog, a golden retriever, enjoys peanut butter. (The appositive, ‘ golden retriever, ’ explains and identifies ‘ my dog. ’ )

What is the relevance of appositives to The Stewardship Report ? As a news website, The Stewardship Report articles constantly explain the identities of people with the use of appositives. Incorrectly punctuating appositives is a common grammatical error, and, in our attempt to be a professional news source, is something we must avoid. The following details a commonly accepted rule on punctuating appositives.

An appositive is offset by commas on both sides if the appositive is not vital to the meaning of the sentence.

Tony Blair, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom , spoke at the United Nations today.

This sentence would retain its meaning if the italicized appositive were removed.

An appositive is not punctuated if the appositive is vital to the meaning of the sentence.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair spoke at the United Nations today.

Without the appositive ‘ Tony Blair, ’ this sentence would not make sense.

You should strive to follow this rule when you write and edit The Stewardship Report articles.

Quotes. See Category: Quotation templates for available quotation templates.

Professional news organizations will occasionally introduce errors in punctuation and spelling in spoken quotes. Be sure to proofread a quote before adding it to a story.

You may choose to directly quote or paraphrase a source:

‘ Puppies are fun and cute, ’ John Doe , American Association of Puppy Lovers president, said.

Puppies should be treated with respect and groomed well, Doe added.

When editing spoken quotes, or informal texts and transcripts intended for exclusive interviews (emails and text chat logs), it is permissible to correct typos and errors in punctuation introduced in the transcription process as long as the edit still expresses the meaning exactly the way the source intended.

When paraphrasing, be sure to word the statement so that it expresses the meaning exactly the way the source intended.

To exclude a section of quoted material for summarizing or avoiding a confusing section of quoted material, use an ellipsis (…) to replace the removed text. If many lines of a transcript are removed, place the ellipsis on a line of its own where the removed text would have been. Be sure the remaining quoted material is not taken out of context; the text must express the meaning exactly the way the source intended.

To add clarification to a quote or transcript, use square braces ([]) to contain the words you have added, making sure your additions expresses the meaning exactly the way the source intended.

Adding images or other pictures. When including pictures with The Stewardship Report stories, they must abide by The Stewardship Report’ s image use policy .

Using The Stewardship Report image template for articles. The most important reason why pictures are used in The Stewardship Report stories is to help convey a clearer or more complete message for the reader. All images must be relevant to the story in which they are included. If this is unclear, then the relevancy must be detailed in a caption. The following code is for including a story image with a caption (Image, Specify box with caption, box size, caption, and image credit) that you may cut-and-paste into your stories:

Image Captions. Image captions should be made of complete sentences. At the end of the caption, the original source of the image should be revealed (if possible) and written in italic print to offset it from the rest of the caption.

Style Issues not Covered by this Guide. If you have a journalism style question which is not answered by this guide, please refer to one of the below professional (and free) online style guides:

Wikipedia Manual of Style - Addresses many wiki writing issues

The U.K. Guardian Online Styleguide - British English

The Generalized Stylebook by Tameri - American English

Online Chicago Manual of Style - Academic American English (Used by many magazines as a general stylebook supplemental to a house style)

The BBC News Styleguide - A conversational introduction to BBC English

For general grammar, punctuation and word use issues:

Strunk’s The Elements of Style - A general guide to improving writing.

Style Guide for The Stewardship Report

About The Editors