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• Thursday, December 7, 2006 07:46 AM

  Committing journalism

  My favorite experience as a reporter was back when I was at a community college, majoring in journalism and working at the college paper, and I asked the women's basketball coach for her comment on the fact that her entire team had been evicted from a local apartment complex for being loud and disturbing other residents.

  I wish I had kept the tape recorder on, because it was the first time in my life I heard the "f" word used as every part of speech in the same sentence. She also did a lot of other screaming, dragged me to the newspaper adviser and cursed him out.

  I was upset, but having served in the Marine Corps and being a postal worker at the time, I was used to far worse from people in authority over me, though I did demand an apology from the president of the college and the sports director, or I'd go to the local "real" newspaper. I got my apology, and after the coach was terminated for a shoe contract violation, I learned that the incident was in her personnel record.

  Asking tough questions is something journalists have to do. I am pretty shy and sometimes uncomfortable, and I learned that early on, so I moved toward copy editing and have been very successful in that. I occasionally do stories for the paper I work for, just to keep in practice, and have found that the credentials are like a shield. I'm not shy when I'm wearing them, somehow.

  Granted, copy editors (unless they work community or lifestyle sections) have to work bad hours, but I still find what I'm doing in journalism interesting. I think you should stick with it, maybe try working at a paper that does community news, or maybe even take courses in overcoming shyness.

  That's my advice, from experience in the business.

  —vsafuto Read vsafuto's other letters
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