wjmc2023 - Tumblr blog

[wjmc2023]

WJMC FULL EXPERIENCE

Sunday

I arrived at George Mason University around 12:30 to my dorm to see that my roommate was already moved in, then I went to The Hub to check in with the leader of my group to make sure she had all of my information. From there on, I talked to a few people in The Hub and made quite a few new friends, then we went on a tour of the George Mason campus.

The food was great, but our speaker Savannah Behemann; a WJMC alumna, former Congressional Reporter for USA Today, and currently is the Senate Correspondent for National Journal.

She spoke on the significance of journalism, especially in the wake of backlash directed towards the field along with disputing disinformation. She also spoke on how competitive the field is; a company rejecting an article of hers but not letting it get to her, but rather going to another one that would carry her story.

I thoroughly enjoyed one of her overarching themes of her speech highlighting the importance of humanizing your story and asking yourself “why should I write this?” and “why would someone read this?”. It’s one of the core values that I find in journalism which is the reach.

She also spoke on taking opportunities and putting yourself out there for potential future employers to see. The need for networking with people in the journalism field and keeping your options open.

Monday

On Monday, we went to Planet Word to check out the museum, and see Doni Holloway, producer of the podcast "Why is This Happening?" and multi-media journalist. The best part of his speech was the story of him meeting Hoda Kotb when he was younger and she wrote a note to him that read "See you at 30 Rock!" it really struck a cord with me because I too met Kotb a few years ago and managed to get a picture with her after she hosted The Today Show.

The rest of the museum was nothing short of fascinating. One of the best parts was the interactive book section where you would place a book underneath a light projector and it would create an animation. Luckily, the camera on my phone works wonders so I could really capture the magic as I turned down the brightness on the screen to reveal the beautiful scene that was projected.

We finished up at Planet Word, and made our way to The White House. It wasn't my first time seeing The White House, but it was my first time seeing it under a new administration. As much power and integrity that single building holds in our country's history, my favorite part was getting a chance to listen to a man speak in front of The White House.

He was posted up at the iconic White House peace vigil. His stand had varying flags of varying countries along with a myriad of global political issues relevant to our time like Julian Assange, climate change, mass shootings, and the war machine.

He talked about the many attempts from the government to remove the vigil, but how they remained triumphant and beat them in the Supreme Court. He also thinks that it's our generations duty to help make the world a better place

After that, we did a tour of the monuments as the day started to turn to dusk. It was my first time seeing the monuments light up in the dark; the coolest one being the Lincoln Memorial.

TUESDAY

On tuesday, we took the bus to the George Mason campus in Washington, DC to listen to a few speakers, Lauren Ober, and Lauren Barron-Lopez. Both of the speakers were amazing.

Lauren Ober is a host of the Spectacular Failures podcast, and an award winning producer for WAMU's magazine Metro Connection. I found her advice about finding your skillset very meaningful. If you don't find your niche or something that you're well versed in (especially in the field of journalism), your experience in the field won't be as enjoyable compared to knowing what you know best.

Another enjoyable aspect of her speech was her belief in going right to the source. Someone asked a question about interviewing people for her podcast, and she said that she practices field reporting; meaning that she meets with the people that she's talking about/interviewing in person whenever she can.

Our next speaker, Laura Barron-Lopez gave the audience a very raw perspective of what it's like to be in journalism, especially for a woman of color. One thing that I very much appreciated was the fact that she wears her hair in its natural curly state; she doesn't water herself down or try to fit in with a certain beauty standard.

There was one quote that she said that really stuck with me, which was "Objectivity makes journalists say difficult things". Things that go against your own biases, but also things that people don't want to hear.

At around 2:00, we went over to the National Press Club to see two more speakers, Nicholas Johnston from Axios, and Alexis Johnson from Vice News. I had been looking forward to seeing Alexis Johnson speak since I have been watching vice for a few years now, and I have seen many of her segments.

Nick Johnston's speech was pretty interesting, he works for Axios News, an online publication that prioritizes brevity in their stories. He talked about building trust with the consumer and delivering news effectively while still maintaining brevity in its delivery along with key details and nuance.

After that was Alexis Johnson, the speaker I was waiting for. She talked about how she started off working at a local TV station doing closed captioning, and she is now a multimedia journalist. Johnson discussed the importance of networking, staying informed, and a very interesting piece of advice; finding a character for a story so the viewer or reader has somebody to relate to when they're getting information from the story.

After her speech, I had time to take a picture with her, and I got her autograph. I asked her a question having to do with facing backlash online when covering controversial topics, she told me that in order to stay safe, make sure to keep your social medias safe and not let bad faith actors get to you.

WEDNESDAY

On wednesday, our first speaker was Anna Layden, a photojournalist based out of Washington D.C. Photojournalism wasn't a career that I had really considered until she showed the evocative shots that she had taken.

She spoke on capturing a certain emotion when she was doing her job, and she also spoke on the hectic nature of being a freelance photojournalist.

Our next speaker was Patrick Money. His speech was on college admission. He talked about what colleges are looking for when it comes to admissions. He spoke on things like extracurriculars and AP & Honors classes and how the quantity doesn't matter to college admissions offices; but rather what the student learned while participating in these activities.

A few hours later, we went to our breakout session speakers. Mine was Donna Harris, a public information officer. She gave us a look at what goes on behind the scenes when it comes to live reporting and public relations. From her speech, I learned about the amount of work that goes into live broadcasting, especially when you're having to contact several different people and organizations in your community.

After the breakout session, I decided to network with Kayla Sharpe, a digital multimedia journalist who has covered many underreported topics around the world. Since my main interest in journalism is political extremism (more specifically the rise of the far right in the west), I asked her how she hones in on a story or issue that not many people may know about so she can get her point across to the reader, and she told me to focus in on one person in the story, to find a character much like Alexis Johnson said.

THURSDAY

On thursday we made our way back to Washington D.C and I went to the African American History museum with a few friends. I had been wanting to go to the museum ever since it was built. The museum had about five floors to it, but we only had time to look at the first floor which was dedicated to the origins of west Africa before the slave trade, and the beginning of slavery.

The most moving part of the museum that we saw was the Emmett Till Memorial. The tragic story of the young boy is enough to bring anyone to tears, but it's the parts that get left out that are especially enraging. Like how his mother got his body out of the Tallahatchie river after he carried a cotton gin fan down to it.

I definitely want to make a trip back down to DC to finish the entire museum, even if it would take the whole day.

After that, we went to the hotel that was hosting our gala. The food that we had there was amazing. Following the meal, we danced for a few hours and then headed back to campus again.

On friday, we packed up all of our stuff from the dorms, and we left. It was bittersweet, I had to leave all the friends that I made throughout the program, but at the same time I had learned so much.