'Sin City' reporting: More work than fun
 NABJ-TV News Team |  |  Damon Maloney working on deadline |
| Damon Maloney & Jennifer Borget |
By Damon Maloney
On my recent trip to Las Vegas, I learned that the city had much more to offer than casinos and cocktails.
I was in “Sin City” for the 32nd Annual National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) Convention & Career Fair. I was one of an estimated 3,000 attendees, which included media professionals, journalism students, presidential candidates and celebrities. Many came to reunite with old friends and colleagues, seek new job opportunities, learn about industry changes and enjoy time away from the newsroom.
I was at the annual meeting working as a reporter for NABJ-TV, the nightly student-produced newscast that covered convention and local news.
NABJ-TV is part of the association’s Student Projects Program, which gives aspiring journalism students the opportunity to work as full-time reporters at the annual convention. To apply for the program, I had to fill out an application and submit work samples. I didn’t expect to make the cut, so I was pleased to be one of the 46 students from colleges and universities across the country selected to participate in the program that encompasses online, newspaper, radio and television media. I was one of 15 students working on the TV side.
I, along with other student participants in the project, landed in Vegas three days prior to the convention’s opening ceremonies. NABJ took care of travel costs and hotel accommodations, and even gave student participants a $125 Visa gift card. The first night in Vegas I met the other student reporters and professional mentors, learned my job responsibilities and got acquainted with the convergence newsroom.
“Revolutionizing Journalism, Transforming the Future,” was this year’s NABJ convention theme. Many of the workshops focused on convergence and the importance of the different media working together to provide the best in-depth news coverage possible. The Student Projects convergence newsroom was set up inside one of the conference rooms at the Bally’s Las Vegas Hotel, the convention’s home base. Each day, every medium put out a new product. By day’s end, all of the student work was merged together and showcased online at www.nabjconvention.org. Each reporter was asked to capture audio and video, shoot still pictures and gather other resources in order to accompany their work and others’ for the web.
NABJ-TV’s news director, Jon Beans, is news director for Alabama’s Public Television station. He expected his staff of students to show up on time, think critically and work hard. To him, we were professional reporters in a real newsroom. Beans’ mentorship team included a number of veteran reporters, producers and news directors from a number of local and national news outlets.
Anchor auditions were held early on. I was picked to co-anchor two newscasts. I was thrilled to do so, but even more excited to get outside of the newsroom and report. Our days were long and jam-packed. We met every day at 8 a.m. to discuss which news, workshops, and special events we’d be covering that day. After the meeting, organized chaos set in. Reporters were off researching topics, calling sources, conducting interviews, writing scripts, tracking audio and working with editors to make sure everything was ready for air by day’s end. Producers kept busy writing scripts, making sure reporters met deadlines, and ensuring all elements were in place for a smooth production. This work made for mostly 11- to 13-hour days.
KTNV-TV, Las Vegas’ ABC affiliate, served as the host station for NABJ-TV. As part of the agreement, KTNV-TV (under news director Karin Movesian) provided their studio set, editors and photojournalists to assist us in producing our newscast. This partnership allowed me to work not only with industry standard equipment, but top-notch professionals. KTNV-TV photojournalists shot most of our b-roll, interviews and stand-ups. They even edited our packages. Throughout the process, they provided useful information and suggestions that helped strengthen our skills and stories. Without their support, the tasks would have been much harder to complete.
During the convention, I reported a story on activities and places worth visiting for those vacationing in Vegas with kids. I also worked on a report involving NABJ attendees’ views on the conference theme and another on a piece of technology used by many of the job recruiters at the career fair.
The most stressful part of my job was condensing my work while still fully and accurately reporting the story. The intimidation factor set in when professional mentors came by and critiqued my work. One person would say my story was ready to go, another would suggest making changes, and after I made those changes someone else would come along and suggest something totally different. That part of the process frustrated me, but I realized they were teaching me how to write more clearly and become a stronger storyteller. I made it a personal goal to listen to every piece of advice, because of these individuals’ unmatchable experience. They were there to steer me in the right direction, and at times that requires a little tough love. I felt stressed and overworked on many occasions, but that’s life inside the newsroom.
The hard work paid off. NABJ-TV aired three solid shows highlighting the 32nd Annual NABJ Convention & Career Fair. Stories ranged from presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s visits to gambling addiction to changes in the journalism industry to the death of Oakland Post journalist Chauncey Bailey, who’s believed to have been killed because of a controversial story he covered.
While in Vegas I had the opportunity to meet with talent representatives from NBC-Universal, get my resume tape critiqued, visit the career fair, network and attend some of the NABJ parties. But most important, I had the opportunity to test my skills and continue to learn and grow as a person and journalist. The relationships I made in and outside of NABJ-TV will last a lifetime. At our last meeting, Beans and the other professional mentors told us how proud they were of the work we produced. They preached the importance of having qualified journalists of color in newsrooms on-air, behind the scenes and in management. They said we helped rejuvenate their spirits and gave them the opportunity to see a little bit of themselves in us. I’m grateful for my time in “Sin City,” and am happy to have walked away with money still in my pockets and a bit more experience to add to my record.
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To see the work of the 2007 NABJ Student Projects Program, including work from Columbia journalism student Damon Maloney, visit www.nabjconvention.org .
To learn more about scholarship and internship opportunities, including NABJ’s Student Projects Program, visit www.nabj.org