Last week, Buzzfeed’s newsletter editor (and recent Mizzou J-School alum) Dan Oshinsky talked with ONA Mizzou via Skype. He talked about a lot of cool things that made me really, really excited to be in the field of journalism and gave some good advice to us young journalists, such as actually leaving campus to visit the Investigative Reporters and Editors headquarters down the street.
But there’s one thing he said that really stuck with me.
He encouraged us to build something.
Anything. Some unique website or blog or feature that shows off our journalistic skill set. Because he — and others such as the sports editor, who’s behind the Modern Seinfeld Twitter account — displayed these skills, they got hired at Buzzfeed.
The times I when I’m the most interested in my work and the least distracted by social media/my iPhone/anything on Netflix are when I’m creating something of my own. It happened in high school with our lit mag and yearbook, and it happened in college when making this website and revamping the Maneater stylebook.
I miss InDesign. I miss Photoshop. I miss being creative on my own time.
So, my goal is to think of a project to start — after I catch up on work and have gotten a little more sleep, of course. (Priorities.) It’ll probably be something I start this summer and (hopefully) continue through the fall semester.
Stay tuned, y’all.
I think it’s a great idea for anyone entering the field of journalism to start to work on creating their own “brand” so-to-speak. Creating something that is totally yours is awesome. Can’t wait to see what you come up with!
Thanks, Elise! I think you do a good job of that with your blog.