We held a panel at Samford today for the journalism students. Publishers and editors from papers across the state came in to visit as part of a visit with the Alabama Press Association. Pictured here are Dee Ann Campbell from the Choctaw Sun-Advocate, a weekly in southwest Alabama, and Leada Gore, who just left the editor’s desk in Hartselle to join Alabama Media Group as the statewide military reporter:
Hopefully it was very insightful for the students. If nothing else they heard the industry leaders telling them the same sort of things we in the faculty tell them. Stuff like:
The secret to getting an internship: keep bugging the person in charge without being a pest.
Learn the skills that you’re taught in school. Then expect to learn many more different skills on the job.
There is a story everywhere. You just have to listen and watch for it.
Bring ideas. Don’t wait for your editor to give you leads.
Get ready to work hard and do a bit of everything.
Don’t think you’ll get to go home at 5.
Writing is writing, but design, photography and videography are important. No one just writes.
Don’t limit yourself (to a style or beat).
Write wherever you have the opportunity to write.
If you don’t read, read, read, you can’t write at all.
Look at the way things are designed. It is having an eye that you can only develop over time if you pay attention.
There is a degree of flexibility that you won’t find in other jobs. This is different every day.
For a young reporter to have a sense of news judgement, you’ve got to develop that, and you do that by reading, meeting people, talking and listening.
Start looking for a job now. Don’t wait until April.
Read their (newspaper’s) copy. Get familiar with the publication, style and coverage.
You can’t have enough internships.
Student newspapers are great, but you need to treat that like a job.
It was a fine panel. We hope to put another one together for the public relations students in the spring.
