It's quite in the newsroom today, with the exception of the police scanner squawking out random jibber-jabber. No phones, no printing fax machines, just:

'Suspect one is a black male, in his twenties, with dreads, baggy jeans, and large white t-shirt. Do you have a twenty on suspect one?'

The scanner is never turned off...and at some point today, I'm going to make calls (or possibly pay a visit) to all the "shops" (newsroom jargon for police departments) in our circulation area to see if anything newsworthy has transpired.

I'm actually the only one in the newsroom this morning because most reporters here file their weekend stories by Friday...or they at least do enough work so that they'd only need to come in for a few hours on Sunday.

In my first week at the Daily Review, I met three of the PIOs (public information officers) at three shops and the interim Hayward city manager...I covered my first fire, wrote cutlines (extended captions) for two stand alone photos, co-wrote a Fourth of July round-up with the only other black reporter at the paper, and began work on a story about a mother who wants the city to bar ice cream trucks from selling toy guns to kids in her neighborhood...

But today is slow. Luckily, there is a blues festival going on right up the street from the paper. I can grab a nectarine from the farmer's market one street over and then head to "B" Street. Or I can sit here, listen to the police scanner and start writing some inches on this toy gun story.

One thing is for sure: being here this first week has reaffirmed for me that I was made to do this thing called journalism.

Labels: internships

I know it's a competitive market for career growth in this field, but our generation needs to take the lead in teaching younger students -- even now, while we're still technically competing for entry-level jobs ourselves.

That's why I find this offer from the Winston-Salem Journal to be very encouraging. If you're working or interning at a media outlet, see if your editor has a similar program. If not, think about starting one.

Labels: clips, college_media, editors, education, internships, journalism, portfolio, skills, teens, young journalists

It had been about six weeks since I mailed off an internship package to my number one choice. I, being confident that I'd already built up a good rapport with the "key folks" within that organization, banked on this being the most promising prospect of the several internship programs I'd applied to for the summer.

I had a phone interview with this organization's recruiter about a week after I mailed in my application. The phone interview seemed to go well:

"I'm really interested in working with "so-and-so", I really admire their approach to multimedia. And I'm especially impressed with the "such-and-such" story that you all published about "such-and-such" topic."

I was confident that I'd at least demonstrated that I knew several things about the organization and the folks responsible for producing the aforementioned work. I was then told I would be contacted in about a week or two, whether or not I was to be brought on as an intern.

Two weeks pass and I meet with my multimedia coach, who happens to work for the organization to which I had applied. She suggests that I call the recruiter and then, if I didn't hear back, send an email.

I had already called, left a message and did not get a response. So, per my coach's advice, I sent an email. And still I got no response.

Four weeks pass, and then five and then six. At this point my anxiety level had reached its highest heights. I was tired of being patient. I wanted to have some idea of what my summer would have been like.

So I hastily picked up the phone and dialed the recruiter's direct line. The phone rang twice and I heard a voice on the other end:

(paraphrased) "I'm sorry, but we did not choose you for the internship. Our multimedia editor is looking for someone who has all the skills required for producing multimedia and just hadn't had a chance to do it at a daily paper. You mentioned that you had not yet learned Flash."

I held the phone to my ear in complete shock (though my voice and tone did not express this to the recruiter). Not only was I disappointed that my ideal summer would not come to fruition, I also didn't understand how my not knowing Flash seemed to be the deciding factor in why I didn't qualify for the multimedia internship.

I immediately wished I went to school as a Flash design major or computer programming major, on top of majoring in journalism. If ever I've felt inadequate, it was after that phone conversation. It was hard for me to swallow the fact that I had worked so hard to learn every other skill involved in online media; and the one skill I have yet to learn has me wondering what else is out there for the multimedia producer who doesn't yet know Flash.

Labels: internships, multimedia

For photographers and page designers, there are quite a few Web sites on the Internet where you can build your own online portfolio.

Doing this will help your internship hunt tremendously. It's a low-cost way to organize and present your work. When you get an editor's attention, they can quickly see your work online instead of waiting for the mail, and losing focus of you in the meantime.

It's also an easy way to show off your work to family and friends who don't get to regularly see the print versions.

The most popular page design site is News Page Designer, this is where all the professional designers have their portfolios.
One very nice up-and-comer is College Front Page. There both photographers and designers can build their own CFP Personals Page, which shows off your work in a very nice revolving slideshow, complete with detailed captions you can type explaining your thoughts for each piece.
CFP Personals also is a bit more fun, it's sort of like the Facebook of journalism portfolio sites.
Photobucket is one of the more popular free sites for amateur photographers.

Regardless of where you build an online portfolio, you'll need to make your pages into much smaller jpg or pdf images. News Page Designer has a tip sheet on how to do this.

Labels: applications, applying, career_advise, clips, college_media, editors, flash, internships, job hunt, media, multimedia, newspapers, online, portfolio, resumes, skills, snd

For most student journalists, the dreamy goal that drew us into this major was writing or broadcasting for some big, extravagant city newspaper or television station. But at the end of 2006, those were the media outlets going through more financial pains than any other in the U.S.

And so it makes a late January piece by the Poynter Institute, titled "Tighter Budgets Slashing Internships," all the more logical. Big metro papers especially are reporting cuts to their internship programs for 2007, unlike any in recent memory. Metro tv news stations aren't making the same slashes, primarily because broadcast journalism students have been willing to work unpaid internships for much longer than print students have (click the title link above to read the complete story, in all its grueling, interesting detail).

We could debate why it's foolish for these papers to cut intern slots -- they're basically failing to train us youngsters properly, and we're the people who may feasibly bring new ideas that could save their sorry butts. But let's focus on what we can control: Pursuing the internships that are available, and learning how to separate ourselves from the pack, in an ever-growing crowd of competition.

Since the mid-1990's, the number of students who've majored in journalism nationwide has increased every single year, through today in 2006-07. That's odd don't ya think? It directly contrasts the dwindling job openings, as this profession goes through a big transition. Most of these students come in dreaming of being the next Anderson Cooper, but will later embrace a public relations opening, or non-profit work (both growing job sectors). But right now, a majority are in the same competitive internship race that you may be in.

So how do you stand out? By starting earlier in college, and realizing the big prize won't be handed to you. Those small community dailies and weeklies are a great place for a freshman or sophomore to work at during the summer. Develop a strategy where you target the papers around your home, or in the cities where relatives live (those you could stand to crash with for the summer, anyways). The days of a sophomore or junior being accepted at a big metro paper after one, or zero previous internships will be gone soon. You will be at a great disadvantage if you wait until junior year to get serious about internships.

Also, print students who do start early should realize a lot of these small papers may not be able to pay much, if at all. That's ok, work there anyways. Broadcast students have been working unpaid for more than a decade. Nobody likes this, even some editors in the Poynter article say hell will freeze over before they don't pay an intern. But it's the reality of working your way up in life.

The Poynter article also says that online and multimedia skills are considered gold by the editors when they choose an intern. That's not really a news flash. Our generation is supposed to be the pioneers of these "new media" efforts. If your journalism program isn't aggressively trying to train you in online, multimedia and convergence efforts, then they are stealing your money. Stand up and demand this training, and go work at the student newspaper and try to figure it out yourself in the meantime while the professors get their acts together.

This week, the beginning of February, is the hottest time for internship application deadlines. If you read this article and feel like you need to get your act together, there's still time. Go to a veteran editor at the student newspaper, or a professor you trust, for advice on how to develop an internship hunting strategy immediately.
Or feel free to e-mail me at bobmoser333@yahoo.com. I'm eager to stay up late into the night to help you polish a resume, craft a killer cover letter, and blow your competition out of the water.

-- Bob Moser
Business Reporter, The Daily Advertiser (Lafayette, La.)
Bowling Green State University journalism grad, May 2006

Labels: college_media, internships, job hunt, resumes, skills, young journalists