On October 18, 2024, Journalism students ventured to New Haven to visit Southern Connecticut State University for its 39th annual Journalism Day. The event included two small sessions and a guest speaker.
First, the students were able to choose a session to go into that interested them most. Some of these sessions included: sports and media coverage, copyright law, AI, quoting, and many more. The session portion of the day started at 9:00 am and ended at 11:30. During these sessions, the students were challenged to complete certain activities on their worksheet given to their group from Mr. Carroll, the Journalism advisor. These topics included, asking a question during a session, getting to know another student from another school, and new information they learned. The group that was able to complete this task was able to win candy as their prize. Another advisor, who teaches the digital communications class, came along, Mr. DiStefano. He decided to take some pictures and come along on the trip to learn more.
After finishing up the first two sessions, students headed into the ballroom to hear from the keynote speaker, Lolita Baldar. Born and raised in Laconia, New Hampshire. Baldar pursued her journalism degree at Michigan State University. Baldar is the military/national security correspondent for The Associated Press. She informed high school students about what she’s been covering over the years. Specifically (in the early 2000s), where she traveled to middle eastern countries like Dubai, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Her stories were interesting with all the conflicts and pressures she had to face. Especially the conditions she faced while writing her articles. Most of the time she was either up in the air on a military aircraft or on the ground with body armor for protection. She had shown proof, with her photos displayed in a presentation, of her in action writing on the aircraft or wearing her body armor for protection.
During the presentation, Senior Meredith O’Brien, “liked how much she talked about her experience, and even at the points where it was scary and dangerous, she was still out there doing her job and persevering.” Meredith continued and said, “I feel like it really made me realize just how dedicated journalists are, like it’s not just writing some basic article about anything, it’s real hard work that real people dedicate their lives to.” The presentation over all wowed many of the students and showed the type of difficulties a journalist can face out in the field. Especially when choosing to visit foreign countries where there might be wars or battles going on.
Many students participated in the final conclusion of the presentation. Baldar concluded her informational presentation with an open floor for questions to the high school students. A question came up from one of our journalists on the PawPrint, Aasiya Bajwa, she asked, “As a journalist how do you feel about President Bush lying to the American public about weapons of mass destruction being in Iraq”, Aasiya had concluded she was not happy with the response she got, “Baldar avoided answering the question completely.” she said.
After the trip concluded, thoughts and comments were shared about how their sessions went.
“Some sessions were interesting, especially the sports in media, but others had no engagement,” shared sophomore, Emerson Dunning. Senior, Meadow Papacoda, she agreed and said, “I felt it was boring most of the time, we were just sitting there listening.”
Journalism students were happy to share their new findings of what they learned on this trip. “During the field trip, I learned a lot about what working in sports will look like. Sophomore Libby Burns continued by commenting that, “The trip really helped me see that I do want to work in sports media or journalism. I learned what I can do starting now to get me to where I want to be and get me to a professional sports league.”
Senior Alyssa Ruthstrom was commenting that she “learned that you have to go out and just do it and put yourself out there. If you don’t reach out and advocate for yourself, you won’t get anywhere.” The trip was full of new opportunities for new and experienced journalists.
Sophomore Libby Burns said, “I would definitely recommend this trip. It was really fun and very informative. I would definitely recommend it if you even have the slightest thought that you might want to go into journalism because it can really help you choose a path for your future.”
