During my freshman year, journalism made me nervous. Even though it was my major, I didn’t know if it was what I wanted to do. The many pathways being presented to me, including online, print, photo, video and social media, left me feeling overwhelmed. I had been told by professors to join the school newspaper to try it out, but I kept pushing it off, too nervous to go to a news meeting.
That’s why I didn’t attend my first news meeting until the fall of my sophomore year. In the spring, I took my first newswriting class and started to see that maybe this was something I could do. I went to my first news meeting after being prompted by one of my then-new class friends, now a good friend, Sara Bedigian. I was just going to attend and see what it was all about. However, at the end of the meeting, I impulsively took the environmental beat, not really knowing what a beat was.
It turned out that meant I had to find a story related to the environment on my own. I ended up searching on the UConn Daily Digest and found a student activist group that was raising money for families affected by an earthquake in Afghanistan. Looking back, it was an easy story, but at the time, I was so nervous going into the interview. I interviewed the president of the club at their booth, where they were holding a Halloween trick-or-treat fundraiser. As the interview went on, I realized how fun it was to talk to someone and learn what they were passionate about. The story was published, and that day I went and picked up a copy of The Daily Campus. My story was on the front page. From then on, I wanted to write more.
Throughout my time at The Daily Campus, first as a campus correspondent and then as a staff writer, I wrote about student groups, explainers, administrative issues and my favorite topic: the UConn housing crisis.
Having experienced being on the waitlist myself going into my sophomore year, I wanted to show the stress and struggles students without guaranteed housing face. I interviewed students on the waitlist and explored the limited options they are left with going into a school year without housing. That story received more than 2,000 views, and from then on, housing became my new beat.
At The Daily Campus, my confidence grew in both my writing and reporting skills. Writing two stories a week as a staff writer strengthened my ability to meet deadlines and turn stories around quickly. I would also like to thank my editors at The Daily Campus for helping me improve my editing skills.
The Daily Campus news meetings gave me my first real introduction to a newsroom, where we brainstormed ideas and often helped each other with stories. That environment further inspired my goal of working in a professional newsroom someday. My time at The Daily Campus also allowed me to build friendships that have lasted outside of journalism.
One of the things I am most grateful for from my Daily Campus experience is that it helped me secure a job after graduation. During the spring of my junior year, I used my clips to apply for a summer internship at The Day, a newspaper about 30 minutes from my hometown. I was hired because they valued that I had written on a variety of topics and could work on a deadline. Last month, I was offered a full-time position at The Day after graduation.
Looking back, what started as something that made me nervous turned into the experience that shaped my path in journalism.