Summer Job taught many skills

As I mentioned in my first post, I feel that this course - CNJ442 - is going to play a pivotal role in my development as a journalist in an industry that is constantly changing. I expect to learn several skills that will enhance my ability to deliver a well-rounded multimedia product and, in turn, heighten my appeal to potential employers.

Having said that, I already have a bit of experience with "online journalism" and it stems from my internship experience as the American Legion baseball beat writer for The Observer-Dispatch this past summer. Not only did I cover New York State's largest American Legion league (Oneida County), but I did so in a way that had not previously been done at the newspaper. I expanded the OD's coverage beyond the daily newspaper and onto the paper’s website – assigning the league its own tab under "Sports" and also running a league blog, which I called "A Look at Legion."

Now, stories about the league (game stories, league notes, features, etc.) were all organized together onto their own page on the OD’s website. This made it much easier for readers to follow along with the league and review past news. In addition, the league’s new niche allowed me to add multimedia components to the legion coverage through such things as photographs and audio interviews with coaches and players.

Perhaps the best example of the power of “online journalism” came in our season preview package. Rather than simply running a story in the paper previewing the upcoming Oneida County American Legion baseball season (as had been done in the past), we took full advantage of the internet’s added benefits. In addition to the preview article (which appeared both online and in print), I also conducted and posted audio interviews with coaches on the upcoming season, and offered in-depth team-by-team previews on our league blog. Each of these added elements drew much praise from league followers and local newsreaders.

Not only did my experience teach me a great deal about "online journalism" and the increasing demand for more multimedia components of news, but it also allowed me the opportunity to share my computer skills with many veteran sports writers at the OD. The paper's sports staff is made up mostly of older, less-technologically savvy individuals. Through my increased coverage of American Legion baseball, other journalists in the sports department learned of the need to change and evolve the manner in which we deliver the news. Perhaps this is most evident in the fact that, since my departure, the OD has added a "High School Football 2008" tab to the sports page of its website. In addition, due to the popularity of my legion blog, the paper has also put more emphasis on its sports blogs, with increased promotion of them while requiring writers to post more often.

Better late than never...

Back in April, I made a foolish decision and decided the Tuesday nights of my senior-year fall semester should be spent in a class called Global Media.

Perhaps to some this might not seem like such a big mistake. After all, the course description promised to teach students (myself included) a great deal about media throughout the world and how different social, cultural and political landscapes shape the media. The description read as follows, “An analysis of issues and practices surrounding globalization, regionalization as they relate to media industries, journalism and communication.”

A global tour of the industry in which I hope to someday make a living...What could be so bad about that?

Well, it wasn’t so much that the class in which I had originally enrolled was bad as it was that there was simply a better, and more practical, option. It took me merely 15 minutes into the first Global Media class period, and a quick peek at the University of Miami’s fall semester journalism course offerings, to realize I had made a mistake.

How could I spend the next 15 weeks in a course that would focus largely on ideological and “academic” concepts that would in all likelihood be of no use to me in my chosen career path? Even more so, how could I do so when a course entitled Online Journalism – focusing on the very core of what it is going to take to survive (and thrive) in the print journalism industry – was being offered during the same time period?

I simply couldn’t.

Less than 48 hours after that first Global Media class, I dropped the course from my schedule and added Online Journalism (luckily there was an open spot) to my fall schedule. And now here I am.

While I am likely the last of my classmates to create a course blog, I am sure glad I am doing so. With the many skills I have already attained from previous journalism courses at UM, my freelance work with The Miami Herald, and a summer-long internship with The Observer-Dispatch in Utica, NY, I feel that this course may very well be the means to solidifying my abilities as a journalist in an ever-changing media landscape.

And if not, I’ll just keep working at it until I get there. Better late than never, right?