Category | Op Ed

CONSENSUS EDITORIAL

Published on April 3, 2007 by The Sentinel

    With only a few weeks until finals, many of us are simply counting
down the days until summer break– or summer classes. For a few others,
however, a major milestone is approaching: graduation.

    For those students, job-hunting season is right
around the corner. A fraction of graduates will have soared right
through their four years here and have stuck to a strict schedule of
school and class, which is perfectly okay. But, as students who are
involved in an organization that is geared towards getting experience
in our future field, these students leave us wondering exactly how they
expect to get a job right out of college without participating in any
organizations.

    Naturally, we have to pinpoint one group of student
notorious for this – communication majors who don’t work for student
media. It is astounding to see the bright faces that pop up and
automatically answer the question “what do you want to do after
school?”

    “I want to have a talk show.” “I want to be a
reporter.” “I want to work for MTV.” More power to you, but don’t you
realize that the only thing that’s going to get you there is
experience? Yes, your diploma is why you’re here, and sure classes are
important. What you will learn in the classroom, however, is not nearly
as valuable to what you could learn practicing in a real-world
environment.

    That’s what internships are for. And guess what? You
can still earn credit hours while working for student media.
  
           
    Sometimes we will get applicants who are seniors
trying to build their portfolio. They were probably told to do so by
their professor. Good advice, but they’re about a year too late. The
key to building a good portfolio is having the ability to be choosy.
Why force yourself to pick from a pile of six articles when your future
is on the line when you could be picking from sixty? 

    You don’t even have to be the best of the best to
work for student media. This is college: we’re here to make mistakes
and learn from them. Do what you can to work for a publication where
you can make mistakes – don’t wait until you’re in the real-world where
your job is on the line.

    The only thing that we in student media can do is
thank you: you’re going to be our competition one day and we already
have the leg-up.