I am making a new thread—WATER COOLER—for us to just chat about STUFF, not necessarily training or stories, but general topics, how we are doing, where we ate dinner, advice to each other on this and that. WATER COOLER is for us to visit, to hang, not necessarily to train.
Topics to throw out, just to get things started (throw out your own):
-- Finding good places to visit in off hours?
-- What’s your town like?
-- Do you feel like you screwed up? (oops --probably didn’t, but keep us posted so we can assure you… )
-- Meet anyone particularly interesting this week? Etc.
(Moving Argenis’s response to Mathtew to WATER COOLER as an example of what might go here… )
Matt Coop - 30 January 2008 03:59 AM
My major concern is what I will do after the internship. I want to continue to be in the newsroom and thrive, not just be a one-time intern and then go to work at UPS delivering packages to the newsroom. Getting a job after these ten weeks is major concern and goal.
ARGENIS SAID:
Hey Matthew, I think I used to have the same kind of fear you described. I used to think to myself, “Man! What if all this journalism thing (and college thing, to be completely honest) is all just a flash in the pants thing. Something I’ll do while in college but then not even use because I’m a Mexican living in America.” And then it didn’t help that most of my most cynical family members (who have never truly believed that college can improve people’s lives) telling me that I would end up right there with them working at Target or fishing for jobs in the corner with my illegal immigrant cousins.
This fear was heightened last fall when I was nearing my college graduation and hadn’t been accepted by Chips Quinn yet. I had gone to the nearest Target and gotten a job there certain that this was going to be my fate. Just like all my family and practically all my ancestors.
Well, at first I got all depressed, of course. But I think that it’s really not good to look at things like that. Personally, I’m not afraid of being poor. Shoot, I’ve been poor all my life. This internship they’re giving us here is at least an opportunity to do something which is more than my father ever got. I look at it as “Im gonna try my damn best to do this job and if I dont make it, you know, at least I tried my best.”
And, even if I end up picking up cans on the street, I’ll have a piece of paper and a pen in my pocket cause Im gonna be writing about that. No one can take writing away from us (thank goodness).
I dont know, man, that’s just how I look at things right now. I’m just going to give it my best shot.
I’m looking forward to Tuesday’s primary in Calif. After so many states and so much campainign and political overkill it’s the Golden State’s (and others’) time to shine. I know that as journalists we’re not to speak of or suggest any preference toward a specific candidate and/or party. However, coming from someone who has an opinion on everything, it takes a lot of will power to refrain from blurting out my sentiments on various topics....especially with politics.
That’s probably one of the biggest challenges I anticipate having to overcome. Having to become a robot and refrain from showing any type of emotion. What if a kid gets run over and I have to interview the parents? How could I possible look them in the eye and not want to cry my eyes out? For god sake, I’ve cried at The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) commercial with the tear jerking Sarah McLachlan song playing in the background. I know I’m sad and maybe need to get a life, but that’s beside the point. I’m not afraid to say that underneath it all, I’m a mushy person. I have a heart and I have feelings. However, I’m well aware that I cannot afford to wear my emotions on my face. I just can’t. It comes with the profession. So far, I haven’t been faced with a real tragedy or a situation that’s pissed me off enough to forget that I’m a reporter covering an event and want to tell someone where to go and the fastest way to get there.
Yes, it’s a challenge, but I plan on practicing journalism for the rest of my life (or at least until arthritis kicks in and the use of my writing hand goes to hell). I’m not willing to throw it away for a tear or two. The good news is that journalists ARE allowed to vote, as is any other American citizen and I will be casting my vote bright and early Tuesday morning. So there. My rant for the day has ended. Thank you for reading.
That’s probably one of the biggest challenges I anticipate having to overcome. Having to become a robot and refrain from showing any type of emotion. What if a kid gets run over and I have to interview the parents?
Folks—interesting, no? FYI, one of the biggest Emotional Roadblocks I ever had as a young reporter was having to go to the home of a family whose 10-year-old had just committed suicide. How do we do it? Go into robot mode? I, for one, can’t do it....
Wow, where to start. I’ll keep them in bullet form to organize my thoughts. That and I don’t have much to say.
-- Finding good places to visit in off hours?
I have not yet, but plan to this weekend. I have a lot of places close to me, but I want to get to the college (FSU) scene. Need to mingle with the community.
-- What’s your town like?
It’s cold, muggy and full of trees and animals. A bear was hit this weekend and a deer was shot. I hear the weather turns beautiful in a month, so I’m crossing my fingers.
-- Do you feel like you screwed up? (oops --probably didn’t, but keep us posted so we can assure you… )
Actually I did screw up a few times this week. Fortunately it wasn’t a story error. I had volunteered to do a soccer story on deadline last Tuesday and thought nothing of it. Game starts at 7 p.m. and ends at 9 p.m. Get to the office around 9:40 and crank out a story by the 11 p.m. deadline. Simple I thought, man was I wrong.
The game ended and normal interviewing takes place. I got quotes from the winning and losing team, but when I headed back to the press box where I left my laptop - it was gone. My heart raced and the first word that came out of my mouth was S***! I was torn on looking for my laptop or hauling back to work to write my story. It was 9:30 and the trip back was around 30 mins. So If you can imagine someone running around a high school soccer field yelling obscenities - that was me. Fortunately I had made friends with most of the people in the press box and one of them pointed out my laptop was taken to a shed for safekeeping. Phew! Stories not done though because I still had the trip back to the office.
As you can guess I got lost. I thought I was on a different street and followed for a good 10 minutes until I realized this doesn’t look familiar. So I took the advice I gained at CQ, rather than drive around lost (it was 9:45), and called my editor. His reaction when I told him? “Yea, your lost,” he said laughing. Following the quip he led me to a main street, I got the the office around 10:20 and cranked out a story by 11:20. (He gave me extra time because of my circumstances).
Moral of the story? Watch your stuff, keep your editor updated (good or bad) and always keep calm. Everything works out in the end. Jeez, this must be the longest post I have written.
-- Meet anyone particularly interesting this week? Etc.
Not this week, but the first week I arrived. The salesperson who sold me my bed is Amani Toomer’s cousin. I have also met the executive editor Bob Gabordi, who is a huge fan of John Quinn. He has a great story of how John would offer him a ride home from work everday when he was a reporter. I felt honored to know he had that much respect, and maybe that was the reason I was at the paper. Amazing how the degrees of separation works in journalism. Of course I met all the Chipsters and Chips Quinn staff.
-- In response to Michael’s post. I like the advice given at the CQ Orientation. Worry about what your doing now, and the future will follow. (I know it’s horribly quoted). It’s so true though. The only thing you can control is what happens now.
-- Somewhat related. I never thought people talked at the watercooler like they show on telelvision. It actually happens. Just an observation.
Amazing how the degrees of separation works in journalism ...
I never thought people talked at the watercooler like they show on telelvision. It actually happens. Just an observation.
Degrees of separation… I always say that in journalism, it’s not six—it’s two....
Hello Chipsters, It’s good to have this Water Cooler thing just to talk about our overall experience in the newsroom. Anyway I’ll try to make it short. So far, I’ve met wonderful people, and I did my first assigment. I was scared to death when they told me I was going to do the police beat on Saturdays, I know some of you have already been doing this in your newsrooms but I have never done it in my entire life. I shadowed a reporter on Thrusday and we went to a crime scene it was really exciting because I got the chance to help. I guess my main concern is not been able to get all the facts from the police and also to be able to report everything quickly and write it well and accurate so I will appreciate any tips on police beat…
I guess my main concern is not been able to get all the facts from the police and also to be able to report everything quickly and write it well and accurate so I will appreciate any tips on police beat…
I’m about an hour and a half away from completing my first week at the copy desk for the Contra Costa Times and I have to say that this was probably one of the smoothest and hardest week for me. Everyone that I have met at the paper seems down to earth and willing to help. I was set up with a mentor, who is a cool guy, but I can still seek help from others (so they say). I’ve gotten a lot of good and constructive feedback and a couple (or partial) of my headlines and cutlines have made the paper. Great feeling by the way.
The hard part about this first week is that I am too far from home to drive every day. I am a family guy who like to hang out with brothers, mom, nephews, nieces, girlfriend and everyone between, and it has been hard for me, to be here, knowing that my family is up I-5 (after 680, and 505) and I can’t see them. It’s hard to go through a day without getting cursed (brothers) at.
I wan’t to hear: “Hey Tito.”
“What?”
“F*** Y**” (Very random but I always do this with one of my brother’s).
I don’t know anybody in this town and the people I’m rooming with work during the day so no one is ever home when I get up. I still don’t know what one roomate looks like! I’ve never not been with a friend or family member for more than five days. I’d like to think that I’m getting used to this place, on my own and all, but it’s going to take a few more weeks. I don’t want to run home every time I get a couple of days off. But I am this week. Super Bowl!
Although I don’t care for either team, I’m going home to watch it with people who I know. It’s bad enough that I’ve had to eat breakfast, lunch and dinner by myself for the last five days but that’s not happening tomorrow.
Well, I had a great first week at the Orange County Register. After a quick orientation, I was sent to the paper’s north office in Anaheim - just a few blocks from Disneyland-. There my editor told me that two sisters who were also young mothers had been killed Saturday night in a car accident and that they were trying to find their families. I was sent to the accident site to try to find anything that would lead us to the families. What happened next is all beginners’ luck: at the site I happened to run into the girls’ youngest brother who was nice enough to give me his mom’s phone number. My editor was very happy and I had a B1, double byline on my second day at work.
I wish I could say the rest of the week was as glamorous but the truth is it was a little slow. Like Ana, I’ll also be covering cops on weekends. I’ve never done this before either but because there aren’t many people on duty on weekends, I’ll also have the opportunity to work on bigger stories if anything happens while I’m there.
Like Ana, I’ll also be covering cops on weekends. I’ve never done this before either but because there aren’t many people on duty on weekends ...
Folks—cherish your chance to work on cops. It is the classic training ground for young reporters. Do as much as you can. Go out whenever you can (to a crime scene, with a beat cop, to interview victims, whatever.) Reporters who have learned to nail cops have created a very useful stepping stone ...
Ana & Maria: I thought of another piece of “advice,” this one from Edna Buchanan, the legendary Miami Herald cops reporter, now, a crime novelist:
“Always ask what the victim was wearing.” (This comes out of a story she tells about her early days when she covered a murder of a guy and it turns out the victim was in drag… she hadn’t asked the question. Thus, that great and telling detail didn’t get into the story. Good advice.)
I don’t know anybody in this town and the people I’m rooming with work during the day so no one is ever home when I get up. I still don’t know what one roomate looks like! I’ve never not been with a friend or family member for more than five days.
Sergio,
Try and hang out with the staff. We had a “Super Bowl” party if you will at the newsroom and I decided to join in. I had a blast.
I’ll be doing the same thing tomorrow. I have a digital camera to take photos of players that are signing letters of intent to colleges on signing day. Should be good experience.
As for journalism, I think readers would benefit so much more from some actual opinion from the writer.
Journalism should be a little more proactive in change rather than just acting as some silent, objective bystander. By being more demanding and inciting, journalists might create a culture where the citizens (readers) will be more demanding and active as well.
Argenis et al: This is an interesting idea. There was a time when journalism was very much the province of opinion (look back at the early days of the Republic), and then, for many years, crusades on various social issues (19th/ early 20th Centuries). That changed, and the news pages became—and have remained—distinctly objective, with opinion/ crusade contained in the Op-Ed pages. The whole internet era seems to be ushering in a new mix that leans more toward airing of opinion (witness the blog), especially given the reader-driven content (and things like the polls you mention) that so many news organizations are looking to generate. And that creates new challenges for us as purveyors of the news.
Should we air opinion? Do we keep it in a special place (i.e., column? blog?) Does the use of voice in some stories imply opinion, even though it might not be explicitly stated?
