All Good Things Must Come To An End!

Who knew, way back in January, when I wrote my first entry, that I would have had one of the most enjoyable and valuable learning experiences of my life. My internship with WYTV/WKBN will be missed dearly. It was one, of a few things, that I looked forward to doing every week. It was so exciting and I never knew exactly what was going to go on, or where I would be going. I have also experienced a lot of firsts with this internship, such as stand ups, indoor arena football, election night, ice hockey, and how can we all forget, an RBI.

I have experienced a lot of happy and exciting events, as well as a tragic event. All which I will hold dear to my heart. My first stand up is something that I will never forget. Most of my broadcasting experience has come from reading scripts. So when I was practicing what I was going to say I stumbled a lot, mainly because I was nervous. This stand up was with Bill and he is such a great storyteller that I was just as nervous doing it in front of him. I was so pleased with how it came out. Bill did such a great job making me feel comfortable and so proud of what I accomplished. One of the best pieces of advice that Bill gave me was to tell a story as conversationally as possible. This is something that was very hard for me at first, but with practice, I have seen a major improvement.

Something else that really stands out is my first experience covering indoor arena football and ice hockey. I was so energized and ready for just about anything. I am so glad that I got to experience these kinds of things while doing my internship. I also picked up a few pointers when I went out with Joe to get some footage for a feature story on the Mahoning Valley Thunder. These are pointers I am going to take with me and continue using. One of those pointers I will always remember is that you don't always get to find out background information on the people you are interviewing or about the story you are going to do, so when you do a stand up you just need to be simple and to the point, and feed off of what the interviewee says. This I believe will not only help me in my final year here at college, but in my future as a broadcaster.

There are also many other things I will not forget. One of those things happened to hit close to home. That was when I went out with a news video journalist for the day and ended up covering a fatal accident that was a young student here at Westminster. It really hit me, because in sports, what goes on is a lot of exciting action, in news it’s not always as joyful. Some days you may cover something that is going on in the area that is very joyful and giving, things charity related. Then there are the things like covering a tragedy, whether it is a fire or an accident that are never easy. There are even times when you may know or be close to the person you are reporting on. That is just the difference between news and sports.

My time at the station went by so fast. I am still going to keep in contact with all of them. Bob is actually going to be looking at my packages that I am going to be doing for Titan Town Sports as part of my senior project. A lot of people I have talked to said that during their time at an internship they did not get hands on experience and that a lot of what they were doing was running errands or going on mail runs. I can honestly sit here and say that this was an amazing internship. I met a lot of nice people, learned a lot about myself, and gained a lot of knowledge. I was very blessed to be given this opportunity and to have worked with such great people!

Things That Happen Everyday in the Newsroom....

My internship this week was different than most. This week Bob asked me if I wanted to go out with a VJ in the news department. Since before in the past, I haven't got too many opportunities to go out with someone in news, so I thought this would be a great opportunity. Little did I know that Tuesday would be life changing for me.

Early that morning we received a phone calling telling us that there was an accident on the interstate. All I kept thinking was that I was hoping it was nothing serious because I have never been one for the sight of blood or anything worse. We drove on the interstate and saw the tow truck. We had to park on the opposite side of the road. Guess what that meant? We were going to be running across the interstate and as if that wasn't dangerous enough we were going to be running across the road with equipment. These are things though that happen all of the time when you are in news...you never know what's going to happen or what to expect.

We got some footage of the accident and then met with the trooper to get details about the accident. The only thing we found out was that it was serious and the driver was life- flighted to an area hospital, and a one vehicle accident. We left and after being back for awhile it was time for the noon news. The competing station had declared the accident fatal, but the officer had told us it wasn't. We finally got confirmation, and the accident was fatal. I kept thinking about it, and was glad in a way that I did not see the accident as it was being handled, but just saw it being cleaned up.

Later that night I got news that the driver of the car was from my college. I didn't know what to feel at that moment. My heart kind of sank. I was sad for her, her friends, and her family. I had only known of her, so I really didn't know her. In a way I was kind of glad that I didn't, because if it had been one of my friends out there I don't know how I would have reacted. This really hit home to me.

This is something that could happen at any time when you work in news. You never know what to expect. News is a lot different than sports. When in sports everything is pretty much happy, and fun. Most things I've seen in news so far have been very emotional and serious. I think people who are in news deserve a lot of credit. They witness things that are really serious and can too be in harms way, just like police officers and firefighters. I really hope that I can get a job in sports right away, but if now I guess I know ahead of time what I will be in for if I go in to news.