More Questions than Answers....

I am writing this post on Tuesday night as I am trying to motivate myself to write a news article to be posted on the web tomorrow morning, because a meeting ran late this evening. The fact that I am writing this late has nothing to do with the rest of this post. I enjoyed attending the meeting this evening as the Columbia branch of the NAACP had the opportunity to listen to 1st Ward City Council Candidates. This meeting is very important for numerous reasons and I was very happy that I had the opportunity to attend.

After receiving the email about how many posts each of the Advanced Newspaper Reporting students have done this semester I felt jealous and angry because I did not have the most posts in the class. Even if I came close, I didn’t feel like I was the best, and not only was I not “number one”, but I was letting myself down. This reminded of the class discussion we had last Wednesday, because we often do not want to accept minute amounts of congratulations in such a competitive environment. In feeling jealous I remembered numerous conversations I have had with fellow journalism students about the Missourian, the J-School, and the positive and negative effects of our education. The class discussion, the conversations with fellow classmates, and my jealousy lead me to two questions. First, if many of us spend literally almost all day in the newsroom and have very little social life outside of journalism how do we maintain sanity as those we are closest to are the same people we are competing with not only for grades but also, as many of us approach the working world, for jobs in an economically volatile time? Secondly I am left wondering what is the goal of journalism when journalists are often competing so intensely that they lose sight of informing the public and enabling the public and are left with hundreds of clips, a good job, and no friends?

I often have to remind myself that the work I am doing is for people. “I am working as a journalist to help and inform the public.” Although I think Sean’s point made in class last Wednesday supports this idea, I also think Sean’s point is a catch-22 leaving the journalist feeling that his/her work is never enough. I don’t think the death of an individual is cause for celebration, but when a reporter and a newsroom covers a story well should he/she not be humble enough to receive praise?

I watched as numerous fellow journalists last week wondered around the newsroom frantically trying to get stories done while they hadn’t slept in days and were quite ill. I wonder to myself as we provide a public service do we need to ensure that we are supported?

It is often a fear of mine in this newsroom to show vulnerability, because at the end of the day I want that “A”, I want that job in a big city, and I want to know that I have “made it.” This has been my dream for most of my life, but as I look around at the young faces in my classes outside of the Missourian, KOMU, and KBIA I wonder will many of these people be happy living in the suburbs of Kansas City or St. Louis with the friends they made in college and the spouse they meet at some Greek event or was my fight worth it? Were the late nights of studying, early mornings of reporting, and constant questioning of any form of congratulations worth it?

Only time will tell…but at least I have 8 posts up now.