With my head in a cloud and my palms sweaty with nerves, I arrived at KXAN uncharacteristically early for my news internship. The great thing is that I live only 10 minutes walk away.
After waiting for about 20 minutes, debating whether to check my appearance in a mirror, and feeling completely overwhelmed, very unsure and ill-prepared; my supervisor and news producer Haley Cihock walked through the door. It was the first time we'd met. My first impression of her was a lady who was straight-spoken and career-minded. She was also only a little taller than me, which was reassuring for some reason. With a brief introduction, she took me straight into the 2:15pm editorial meeting. Three weeks later, sitting in on the editorial meeting has become part of my routine.
As I sat in the news director's small office with seven other strangers, my fretting continued. Should I give up my chair to the lady sitting on the floor? Do I need to take notes? Maybe I should just smile and nod. Yes, good idea!
After the meeting, Haley handed me a yellow packet of information and forms to be signed. The yellow folder, although very important-looking, didn’t seem to give me a clear picture about what I’d be doing exactly at KXAN. I think I was expecting a run-down of what a typical news intern did throughout their day. Maybe even a checklist of duties would've reassured me. But I would learn very quickly that there is no typical news day. Duh!
And interns aren't typical anything. We try to absorb as much as we can from anyone who'll give us the time of day. Nor do we have a desk or table, so you basically need to hunt for a free computer and hope no one needs it. It's a weird in-between, non-existent sort of being; existing somewhere without a place to stake your claim.
Back to the first day: Haley gave me a quick tour of the studio and I realised how much technology has influenced broadcast news stations. Robotic cameras filmed the anchors during the newscast! After I met more co-workers from the control room and the marketing department, she suggested I pick a reporter to tag along with. Nothing had really registered in my brain during that first meeting, but based purely on her kind face, I decided to follow Shannon Wolfson, who was filming a story about a man recently arrested for impersonating a female Los Angeles model. Completely not typical!!!!
So I hopped into a KXAN ford explorer with Shannon and Daniel (photojournalist), who has become my best teacher. Chasing this story didn't really help with my disorientation because we were literally following leads and investigating as we went driving all over and outside of Austin. We visited Pflugerville with no luck, then drove to Georgetown to interview a detective involved in the case.
Shannon, as well as writing a news package and filing a web story, needed to practice her news read for the 9pm CW news, which she anchors. Once 9pm rolled around, I watched her in action in the studio sitting beside the floor director as he controlled the robotic cameras.
Finally, my whirlwind of a first day was topped off by watching the 10pm newscast. This time from behind the sub control room desk with producer Haley as she guided the team through the broadcast.
In the days following Wednesday, 20 Jan, I panicked a little (ok a lot) about my inexperience. With some words of encouragement from my mum, I'm going to fudge (fake) this like Oprah did when she first started out. Well I've survived eight shifts and discovered that I'm not so terrible after all.
Helping out Daniel courtside
at an amateur game - Cedar Park stadium, Austin
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