Folks—What are the most important skills/ lessons you’ve learned thus far?
How do you plan to carry those forward?
What have been your biggest surprises?
Which story or skill do you hope to work on before ending? 

Deadline: Friday 7-30. Keep those clips and updates coming via email.

So far I’ve learned that its your personality that really makes the internship a success. I do know the city I’m interning in very well, but I feel like I have connected with the staff, interviewees and the subjects to the point that I haven’t had to do much work. I think the other thing I have learned to value is planning, as in setting aside time to do things. I have gotten lucky enough to cover some really fun stories, but if I didn’t have the hours, I wouldn’t have been able to. Also, neither one of my big story ideas came to fruition because I could never fully wrap my mind, time and energy around them. So it was a good learning experience in that sense.

Going forward I hope to take those things into account and really balance/manage what I do better so that I can complete tasks. I’ll also probably hold onto those ideas and see if I can eventually bring them together lol.

My biggest surprise has been twofold: the staff has been exceptionally nice and I’ve been taken seriously. Just about everyone I have worked with knows me smiles, chats me up or offers to help more than I would expect. As far as being taken seriously it’s nice because I have screwed up quite a bit during the internship and for the most part I’m not very serious at all, so the situation hasn’t lent itself to that positive a result.

I hope to work on determining what is important in a story and working on an an important story. Certain details in stories and small facts are really important to me, and usually an editor takes them out. Not to mention, they always ask questions about things that are missing in the story, that I don’t feel are important enough to mention. As for writing an important story, I kind of want to handle a subject that’s a more difficult. Something that takes a little time to write and isn’t event coverage, an editors assignment or something minor. So I’m looking for that opportunity!

I’ve learned a couple things through editing so far. For one thing, if I am confused about a part of the story - then I should probably call back and ask more questions. One editor asked me questions about a lot of details in stories that it made me spend more time in the pre-interview stage where I thought of questions to make sure I would understand everything.

Also - while I covered a protest I had to have my first correction because a man said I misunderstood his position. I thought he was OK with tolls on bridges, turns out he was only OK with tolls on one bridge - not all of them. From that, I learned in especially those situations I should double check, repeat whatever it takes make sure I have people’s positions on an issue correct. From another editor, I learned to reread and reread to see where words could be cut, rephrased to make it more clear and less wordy. In one story I sent to Mary Ann she pointed out that I kept using the same words. Looking for words that I repeat is also a good lesson.

One basic lesson that I learned the hard way was to ALWAYS get EVERYONE’s call back number. I usually ask for this but for some reason the one time I forgot to ask for this I actually needed it. I had to go on a wild goose chase via the internet to track down these people. Now I always ask for it, even if I don’t think they will be a big part of the story - always.

I plan on moving forward with these lessons by thinking more about these small things while working on assignments. I found that writing things out as a list for myself of what I do know also helps because it helps me identify what I don’t know or helps me think of questions.

One thing I was surprised by was how many times I’ve taken a camera out and had to take photos and write a story. I knew before this summer that reporters have to do more these days. I’ve also taken some classes at school about photography and video. However, I thought since the CJ is a pretty big newspaper that I wouldn’t have to do that. It has made me consider asking the photo desk at my college’s paper to let me take some photos so I can get some practice and improve my photography skills.

I have a story that I’m working on about a teen mom going to college that I hope to finish before my internship ends. I also want to write at least a couple of more stories that are my ideas but first I should think of them.

What are the most important skills/ lessons you’ve learned thus far?
How do you plan to carry those forward?
What have been your biggest surprises?
Which story or skill do you hope to work on before ending?

I’ve learned quite a lot in this internship (especially since it’s been my first one).
1. I’ve learned that fact checking is probably the most important thing about journalism. There’s been a few times where my editor has asked me to check something and it turns out I missed something or misspelled. There’s been other times (very few in number) that my editor and I have both missed something. (For example, I have a correction running tomorrow for the name of a convenience store that a source told me and that I didn’t bother double checking. A very dumb, avoidable mistake.)
2. I’ve also learned that there’s no cap on how many times you talk to a source. If you need information or the right information, you call as many times as you need and do it with confidence.
3. I’ve also learned that you can’t go wrong with a good quote at the end of a story...but kickers are more fun!
4. Story organization is key and sometimes it takes your editor to tell you what works best because you can’t see it.
5. Even if you’re not familiar with the city you’re in, you can still find ways to enterprise stories. Not being a native give you a fresh perspective.
I hope I can use all of these for the rest of my college years in the newspaper and in every journalism internship/job I get.

Biggest surprises:
1. Sometimes, you can write an article based solely off of phone interviews (but they lack color).
2. The news can get quite slow in the summer.
3. Not being a native of the city you’re in is no excuse!

Before I leave, I want to work on a story that I’ve come up with on my own (refugee population of Austin). I also want to finish strong with strong clean articles.

This sort of unrelated, but I wanted to say I had two firsts of my internship with the same story that came out today:

1.) One of my stories was the front page centerpiece of the Tri-Valley Herald (one of the sister papers of the Contra Costa Times, part of the larger Bay Area News Group) today!
2.) I had to write a minor correction for that same story.

The story was about a father and son from Livermore (in the San Francisco Bay Area) and the son did a two-and-a-half minute documentary on his father, a blacksmith. The film is currently a finalist in Mitchum’s “Hardest Working Person in America” contest. My mistake was fairly technical—I wrote that the son/filmmaker would donate any winnings to a nonprofit called charity:water and that he is working on a short film for their campaign in Haiti. While I was right in saying he would donate money to the nonprofit, my mistake was that the film he is doing in Haiti is actually unrelated to their campaign.

(The story is here if anyone is interested: http://www.contracostatimes.com/ci_15668689)

Anyway, I’m getting anxious about things winding down for the summer but I’m hoping to apply for a full-time reporter position with the Bay Area News Group. As for my goals for the rest of the internship, I’m working on a big feature and I’m hoping to be able to do justice to these three families whose daughters suffer from a neurological disease called Rett Syndrome. I’ve been keeping pretty busy these last couple months filling in for reporters who have been on sick leave or on vacation, and I think I’m still looking to be full-time reporter!

Best, Kim

What are the most important skills/ lessons you’ve learned thus far? I’ve learned a lot of video skills and to read between the lines in e-mails.
How do you plan to carry those forward? Video editing and familiarizing myself with equipment has been really helpful because I’m picking a lot of skills regarding film technique.
What have been your biggest surprises? That I can lift some pretty heavy equipment on my back. (A lot of the job, surprisingly, was physical labor when we were getting ready for shoots, etc.)
Which story or skill do you hope to work on before ending? I’m really hoping I can finish a video about green funerals that I shot before I leave.