Danielle Burkett

Introduction:

 

During the fall semester of my senior year I had the opportunity to intern at WHAG-TV Hagerstown, Maryland. I was a news room intern which meant I got the opportunity to work closely with various reporters. WHAG is a television news station located in Hagerstown, Maryland which broadcasts to portions of a four state area: Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia. My site supervisor is Jeff Bowers, Executive Producer and anchor. When I began my internship I created two learning objectives. The first of which was to learn the stages of covering a news event-from the assignment stage to the final edited piece that goes on air. I would hopefully achieve this goal by attending the morning pitch meeting, shadowing and assisting reporters, and observe various reporting styles and techniques. My second learning objective was to learn how to edit stories using Avid software/ how to use iNews system so that I can apply these skills to my resume. Through observation and practice I would hopefully gain the skills I wanted to learn.

 

Work/Projects:

First and foremost, as an intern my goal was to learn as much as possible what it is like to work in a news television station. During my internship I was able to work with different reporters and learn from them, observe their various styles of reporting, editing, scripting, and interviewing. While the quality of their broadcast pieces remained the same, no reporter has the same work style. I mainly shadowed reporters Carmen Chau and Nicole Galbraith during my internship. They gave me advice on editing, interviewing techniques, creating story ideas, and contacting potential interviewees. When I’d go out on a story with one of them, they were extremely willing to answer my questions, they’d let me practice various skills, and they’d give me suggestions for improvement. I was able to work with the camera, film footage for their stories, I recorded anchor standups, and I was even able to create interview questions and interview people occasionally. I’d help with researching, scripting, writing stories for web, and editing.

 

Being able to work with reporters and follow them into the field as they did their stories was extremely interesting. I wasn’t just a bystander observing them as they worked; they let me be involved in throughout the entire process of covering stories. I didn’t have a specific project I worked on during my time at WHAG; instead I tried my hand at a variety of things and tried to gain as much experience as possible. On the last story that I worked on with Carmen Chau, she let me conduct our first interview for the piece, I asked the questions and filmed the interview, I took b-roll footage, contacted another person for an interview, recorded an anchor standup, helped with scripting, and then put together my own version of the story.

 

Learning:

Throughout my internship I was able to gain insights to the ins and outs of being a reporter at a news station. I saw every step of the process: from the morning pitch meeting where stories were approved and assigned, to the research and contacting people for interviews portion. I’d follow the reporter out into the field to film interviews and b-roll. Then we’d go back to the studio to write the script and edit the footage to create the product that would go out on air, before the deadline. I also got to observe how the reporters go live on air to front their stories and then got to see how they create the web story as accompaniment to their broadcast story. I also got the opportunity to shadow Taniya Wright for a day and learn about being an anchor/producer and the work that goes into creating a good show.

 

I learned that in order to be a successful reporter you need to have confidence, the ability to effectively connect with people, the persistence to pursue leads, and of course good filming, editing, and scripting techniques. I quickly learned that I needed to step out of my comfort zones and do things I normally wouldn’t do, like continually calling an individual because we needed someone to speak on camera about a certain subject. Or walking up to a random stranger and asking them if they’d be willing to speak on camera about a topic we were covering.

 

Future Plans:

I have learned a great deal of practical experience that I can carry with me into my future. The skills I’ve gained in communicating effectively in arranging interviews, interviewing, filming, editing, and scripting will be extremely useful. Working with AVID iNews, a program I was unfamiliar with going into my internship, is yet another practical skill I can add to my resume.   

I am very grateful for the opportunity to shadow and work with the reporters at WHAG, but I’ve learned that the life of a reporter isn’t necessarily something I could see myself doing. I love working within the news industry. I like receiving a story idea and then doing the research, writing, filming, and editing. I just don’t like the on-camera portion of being a reporter and quite honestly I don’t think I have the right personality type to be a reporter. This experience has helped me put my career goals into better focus. I would like to continue working within the broadcast industry, possibly as a producer or editor since I feel I am more useful in the behind-the-scenes, supporting roles.

 

Preparation/Recommendations:

I felt like my education has been helpful in giving me good experiences and the basic skills that are needed for joining the journalism industry. Through my classes at Messiah I have been able to learn about the process that goes into producing stories for the general public. As helpful as my classes have been, I think the experience that has helped me out the most has been working within the media lab practicum. Media lab gave me the ability to write for radio and print. Through the partnership Messiah had with Temple University I was able to attend classes that were previously unoffered at Messiah, such as TUTV: Crossroads. In TUTV: Crossroads I was able to pitch and create an editorial news piece, I got hands-on experience filming, interviewing, scripting, and editing which certainly helped me as I entered into this internship. Because of the skills I gained in my classes at Messiah and Temple, I felt better prepared to enter this setting. My only recommendation that I have for the Communication department would be to offer classes in television newsgathering/ production since gaining hands-on experience would be beneficial to students looking to enter the broadcast journalism field.