Job Shadows: What You Saw, Part 5

Here's a sampling of some of the various job shadows done by you all (this will be updated as job shadow reports are turned in, so please check back frequently). Take a look and see what you can learn from everyone's visits. There's a lot of good stuff here to help you decide what you want to do with your lives; what you need to be doing to get there; and what to expect when you do get there.

Please give each one of these a quick read as they come in, will you?

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For this assignment I job shadowed Justin Rose. A sports reporter/anchor of WXYZ channel 7 news, which is located in Southfield and covers the metro Detroit area. He graduated from Michigan State in 2007 and had jobs in Lansing, West Virginia and Pittsburgh before getting to return home when he was offered this job in September of 2014.

When I first got to the station he gave me a tour. He showed me all the different sets and let me take pictures. Then we went back to his desk where he explained to me a “typical” day for him. His days typically consist of him attending and covering one of the major sporting events going on. I was there on a Sunday, so he had covered the Michigan game the day before and normally he would be getting ready to attend the Lions game if they were at home, but because they had a bye week he was going to the Red Wings game instead.  While he is out in the field he sends his producer a heads up of what the highlights have been and what his story will focus on that way they can insert the correct b roll while he talks.

But first he had to tape his sports talk to show Sports Cave, which he does every Sunday. So when we sat down he showed me the rundown of the show and notes he had taken for the things they were going to cover. He had notes regrading both the Michigan and Michigan State games and the big changes the lions had made over the week. He explained that this show differs from what he does every other because he doesn’t need to be as scripted. He just needs topic reminders on the teleprompter as opposed to a script that he would write on the days he is anchoring and not reporting in the field. His working environment seemed very easy going, everyone was super friendly and talkative.

He mentioned that he enjoys the more free formed stuff because he has a passion for storytelling, he enjoys meeting with people and hearing how sports has impacted their lives. He mentioned that here in Detroit we have some of the most ride or die sports fans ever.

I got to watch him tape his show, and met the production manager Mike. He mentioned the importance of being well rounded in every position in this field because you never know when you’re going to need it.

Justin went on to tell me that when he is shooting out in the field the last thing he worries about is what is coming out of his mouth. “That’s second nature,” he said. Justin said he enjoys writing the highlights of the game. What he is always the most worried about is if the lighting is good or if his shot is focused because he shoots his stand ups by himself.

My biggest take away from this experience was something we talked a lot about. Justin said its good to have a bunch of different goals in mind but embrace what you are good at and run with it, as long as you enjoy it. He talked about how most people who enter the business want to be on camera when the truth is most of them won’t be. He reiterated the point that if you want to be in the business you can’t just limit yourself to one goal.

I believe I have more interest now in this field than I ever did, but I know I have to be willing to embrace all aspects of it.


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I shadowed Kurt Madden who is the Community Content Editor at the Lansing State Journal. Kurt walked me around the newsroom and I sat in on the general meeting where they discussed what stories they were working on. What I found was really interesting was one thing one of the editors said. She was discussing how she wants the journalist’s stories to either be “breaking or awesome” as she doesn’t want to see any of the in-between stories. I found this really interesting because, yes what we report should be breaking news or something awesome that the public should know about. The newsroom was relatively quiet after the meeting, as they were finishing up projects and stories and there were about 15 reporters in the newsroom.

Kurt told me that a majority of what he does is edit content that the community freelance writers send in. He has to make sure that the style and content is formatted correctly. With 44 years of experience, Kurt said that before he was an editor, he was a reporter for daily newspapers around the Lansing area. He said that the stories he wrote over the years, the people he met and talked to, and the community engagement made the long hours and being away from family worth it.

Kurt has always enjoyed writing, which is why he was drawn to journalism in the first place. He likes telling stories and real stories at that, which can help the general public a great deal. The biggest changes, according to Kurt are how it’s delivered from print orientation to digital; the speed of the delivery of news and information has increased dramatically. There are a variety of ways a story can be delivered now. He said that he likes how in journalism you are doing something different everyday and that the days go by fast because of how busy everything in the newsroom is.

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Today I job shadowed Berl Schwartz, who is the owner and publisher of the Lansing City Pulse. Berl is 68 years old and has been in the journalism industry for almost 50 years. He started in 1966 as the copy boy at the Toledo Blade and loved the feeling of being in the newsroom. He went to the University of Pennsylvania and they didn’t have a journalism major so he majored in political science instead and worked at the student run newspaper “day and night” as he put it.

            Berl showed me around the office, which had reporters and the advertising department sitting at their desks. He said that he started the Lansing City Pulse because he had done so many things in journalism over the years and wanted to stay in the Lansing area, so he said jokingly to a friend, “I should start a newspaper.” And that’s exactly what he did.

            He said that no day is typical. On Wednesdays, the City Pulse is published, so on Monday and Tuesday he is editing and there is a lot of proofreading to be done. He said that they also have a radio show and a TV show so each week is pretty busy putting together those as well. Berl has experience as a reporter, editor, publisher and even being the publisher of a magazine in Oklahoma.

            His advice for students is to be prepared for anything and have a variety of skills to offer a potential employer. Going into the future, who knows how it is going to be. Just because print isn’t as much of a demand anymore, doesn’t mean the demand for journalism is any less. Journalists are still the watchdogs. He said that his favorite thing about journalism is when you have a story that gets to the truth.