A major draw to journalism for me was the hope to use it to forward equality, not contribute to a narrow media landscape. The topics I prefer to pursue are societal wrongs with a solution-based focus that analyzes methods of improvement in an easily digestible way. I have worked on stories about discrimination, and though many are not displayed in this portfolio, I feel the work I’ve represented shows my range expands beyond a singular passion. My goal is to reach a point in my career where I have access to as large an audience as possible. Hopefully, I can make as sizable an impact as possible with the skills I have developed through my experience and education.
An important skill to have in the changing landscape of news consumption is highlighting the important and captivating points of a story and presenting them in a way that grabs people’s attention. Society is fairly socially conscious in the present day and I believe investigative journalism is appealing to most audiences, yet because many people are used to mindlessly scrolling until something piques their interest, it’s necessary to learn how to maintain their attention. While at Rhino Marketing, I devised headlines, images and descriptions for articles that would appear on peoples’ online feeds, ideally prompting them to read the whole piece. This experience, as well as the short bills I’ve written for my stories while at CBC, have cultivated my ability to promote important stories. I hope to be an investigative journalist and believe that the value of getting to the truth is important and shouldn’t be replaced by methods of quicker news distribution, but rather helped by them.
Connecting with new people each day is an enjoyable part of the job for me, as a social person. Having a spectrum of perspectives is important to forward one’s knowledge and the diverse mix of people I get to meet while pursuing journalism helps gain that. My various workplace environments have allowed me to associate with people of different backgrounds and I have always managed to develop good relationships with my coworkers and classmates without conflict. During my time leading tours at Kamloops Heritage Railway, I confidently interacted with varied audiences including groups of children, teenagers, young adults, adults, families, seniors, visitors from other countries and more.
While at TRU, I have taken on a leadership role in each group project I’ve been assigned. I’ve learned how best to communicate with each member to ensure everyone puts in their fair share of work. TRU has allowed me other opportunities to cultivate communication skills. I’ve worked on community research projects and many interviewing and story assignments where I’ve been able to develop community connections and even take part in events. I find the best approach when attending an event is being an active part of what’s going on, rather than standing aside and interviewing people when necessary. Courses spanning sociology, psychology, critical thinking and communication have shaped my understanding of human behaviour, essential to grasping the importance of highlighting characters in a story.
My history courses have contributed to the research abilities that help me understand the topics of the stories I pursue much quicker and more thoroughly, which I further cultivated during my time researching at KHR. My writing has also been able to take on many forms from poetry to professional.
I’ve developed many journalism-related skills around interviewing, writing and storytelling. Some courses I took in the journalism and communications program have introduced and improved specific skills of mine such as multimedia design, video taking/editing, decolonizing journalism and feature writing. Decolonizing Journalism in particular has introduced new ways of how to accurately report on communities with respect and employ trauma-informed journalism when needed. Each journalism class has improved my ability to recognize the most important parts of a story. This has been helpful when picking out the best quotes from long interview transcripts both with story assignments and editing for radio with CBC.
I’m driven by the desire to help people more than anything else. I hope to make a large impact on society but I also see value in stories that can greatly impact a small audience.