By Rebecca Doser
FEATURES EDITOR
“It’s about the most fun work other than maybe…being Beyoncé!” NCPR station manager Ellen Rocco declares her passion for working in the journalism industry during a debate on the current state of American journalism last Thursday.
The cozy auditorium in the Richardson basement filled up quickly with sixteen students from Professor Juraj Kittler’s Introduction to Journalism class, editors of The Hill News, a handful of SLU professors and staff members and two accomplished editors, Keith Woods, NPR Vice President for Diversity in News and Operations and Rex Smith, Editor and Vice President of Times Union in Albany, NY.
Both enjoyed each other’s company as they have known each other for the past twenty years in the journalism industry. Their honesty and openness in the debate on the current changes facing each of their industries, public radio and print, proved beneficial and eye-opening for aspiring journalists such as myself.
“The need for journalism is there,” Smith admits. “But the difficulty is how to conserve the industry when the security is dissolving.” Albany is still trying to get a few more years out of print but it is hard, he admits.
“The days of the seven-day-a-week-delivered newspapers are gone,” Woods states.
Times Union, however, is not going to immediately sink all of its money into the digital age quite yet, Smith confesses.With newspapers in decline, the intersection of technology and craft moves to the forefront of the journalism industry.
“The young generation can combine skills of both which is a great point of entry in order to build a case for yourself journalistically,” Woods says. He mentions blogging as an example, which is reassuring to a food blogger such as myself (check it out: breakfastwithbex.wordpress.com).
Professor Kittler takes this chance to mention the need he sees in educating students on digital humanities in St. Lawrence’s curriculum.
“You have to master the tools of the trade,” Woods says, upon which Professor Kittler describes his plan to argue the importance of a “Digital Humanities” course which will educate many students who assume they are masters of digital communication merely from what Kittler defines as the new agora: Facebook.
But in reality, our digital expertise has the potential to become stronger and what better way to do that than to implement it into the solid platform of our liberal arts education? Smith says he may be biased as he graduated from a liberal arts school himself, resulting in his admirable journalistic career, but regardless, he fully supports the vision of a liberal arts school to provide you with a broader vision of life.
“Don’t let anyone tell you that you need to go to a journalism school to be a journalist,” Smith says. He reassures many students in the room that there is still hope for their journalistic goals.
All audience members’ attention focused in on what Smith outlined as the “Top Four Priorities of An Aspiring Journalist”
1.Well-educated/Smart-Be knowledgeable in multiple fields (a great skill that a liberal arts education will provide) and know how to react in multiple scenarios.
2. Energy-Report fully and do not cut corners. Go the extra mile, dig deeper into a story and go beyond the “he said, she said” format.
3. Curiosity-WANT your story. Do anything in your power to make your story memorable and unique.
4. Technical Skills-Display sophisticated writing skills and have the ability to respond to problems quickly and efficiently.
Above all, Smith repeated one important piece of advice throughout the debate: “Experience makes the biggest difference out of anything.”
Whether that is volunteering for a local newspaper, shadowing accomplished journalists, or writing for The Hill News, any kind of experience you can get will help you in the long run.
“”It will be hard enough to get a job in the journalism industry as it is,” Smith says; a statement not surprising to anyone in the audience who has stayed up-to-date with the struggle of print journalism as it competes with new advanced technological news outlets.
One important realization to keep in mind as an aspiring journalist is that your desire to write, communicate, and inform must come from a deeper passion and love for journalism as opposed to a desire to see $$$$ every time you are published.
“Nobody in my newsroom chose to be a journalist to make a lot of money,” Smith explains. “It’s all about wanting to make a difference and having the passion to investigate and dig deep into a story in order to inform the better good.”
Woods outlines a shift in journalism as becoming an issue of truth rather than of value. The importance of distorting truth for individual benefit is key to current issues such as the NFL hoopla and the U.S. and Syria relations. Wherever the story is, the ability of journalists to shed light on issues and details that the general population cannot see themselves ties journalism to democracy and a greater meaning of life.
“It (journalism) is a great way to think about spending your life,” Smith concludes. “But like ballet dancers, know that you’ll be waiting tables between gigs.”