Real-world reporting experience is essential for anyone who wants to pursue journalism, Ingrid Jacques, a columnist at USA Today, said during a panel discussion last Monday.
A panel of six guest speakers presented for “Career Conversations: Careers in Journalism & Media,” informing students how to make the most of their early writing experiences to garner success.
The panel was led by Tim Carney, a columnist at The Washington Examiner and Jacques, who were joined by Naomi Balk from the World News Group, Brendan Clarey of Chalkboard News, Cole McNeely with the Franklin News Foundation, and Mark Libke from the McKibben Media Group.
Jacques ’02, Clarey ’18, and McNeely ’19 are all Hillsdale College alumni. Jacques was the former assistant director of the Dow Journalism Program at Hillsdale from 2005 to 2011.
The speakers shared their individual stories and how they grew in their careers from their time in undergraduate to where they are now.
“I think that just nuts and bolts reporting experience is really important for any journalist, no matter what you’re going to do,” Jacques said.
While some panelists always knew they wanted a career in journalism and went on to pursue master’s degrees, others didn’t pursue journalism until after undergrad, or went a less traditional route.
Jacques said she didn’t decide to pursue journalism until after she graduated from Hillsdale as an English major. She worked a number of different jobs in the field, such as working for a weekly and daily league in Michigan before stepping into her current role of an opinion columnist at USA Today.
“It’s a challenge in a good way to be a conservative voice,” Jacques said about working at USA Today. “A lot of our readers aren’t necessarily expecting to find my point of view. So, I get a lot of pushback, but I also get a lot of support from people who are pleased to see a different kind of opinion, so it’s rewarding work and I enjoy it a lot.”
Carney said before he was hired by The Washington Examiner, he worked under Robert Novak, the late political columnist, gaining the journalism learning experience of a lifetime. Carney then recognized a need for writing on corporate welfare.
“This was a niche where other journalists weren’t writing about the anti-business people who were socialists, the pro-free market people who just blindly thought that business was their friend,” Carney said. “So, through writing a bunch of articles on that, I then got what was then called the Phillips Fellowship, now the Novak Fellowship, to write a book.”
For some of the panel, starting early on and learning their true passions in journalism was key.
McNeely said he discovered his passion for journalism, specifically radio broadcasting, when he was still in high school. He garnered a substantial social media following and started his own podcasts.
During his freshman year, McNeely was encouraged by John J. Miller, director of the Dow Journalism Program, to get involved with Radio Free Hillsdale, which was a brand new part of the journalism department at the time.
“I credit John Miller a lot for a lot of the good things I’ve done in journalism,” McNeely said. “I was the ad manager for the Collegian and I was involved in the radio station, and I think I was the first sports director and did all the first sports broadcast that was involved with local media around here doing local broadcasts, video streams, and on air stuff for high school sports and things like that.”
After graduation, McNeely worked for radio stations, earned his master’s degree in communication leadership, and started his own marketing company before he was recruited to his current position at America’s Talking Network.
Clarey also started his career in journalism somewhat early on. During his time at Hillsdale, Clarey was an avid writer for The Collegian.
“I realized I need to have some experience doing this,” Clarey said. “I talked to Mr. Miller and he said to do an internship, so I went through the National Journalism Center.”
Clarey interned at the New York Post and after graduation went on to work at the editorial page of USA Today.
“I was a fact checker. I would write occasionally, but a lot of it was reading a lot of pieces, making sure that everything was 100% correct,” Clarey said. “I was also being held to very high standards, and it was a very good experience of thinking through every single argument that’s being made in a piece.”
Clarey noted that because of his vast array of writing experience, becoming a news reporter for the Chalkboard News, a K-12 education news coverage outlet, was a smooth transition.
“It has been pretty easy to switch from opinion to straight news reporting because you have the foundations of good reporting,” Clarey said. “If you are doing that in your opinion work, it’s really easy to transfer to straight news.”
