I feel fortunate to have had the opportunity to attend NPR’s Next Gen Radio mentorship project.
My desire to continue learning more about journalism and audio has been invaluable to me. I experienced in depth the feel of a newsroom, which is exactly what I wanted because I’ve felt that I lacked the experience to work as a team and under a strict deadline. In my studies at CU Boulder’s journalism school, I didn’t really encounter strict weekly deadlines, so I knew that was missing. Next Gen Radio helped me achieve that goal.
The week was jam packed, which I expected. I felt the weight most during the middle of the week, when I ran into problems with Audition on my computer. I am grateful that Patrice Mondragon helped me initially figure it out. However, when Audition problems popped up for a second day, they couldn’t resolve it. Never underestimate the power of saving a project in progress though! Thankfully, my mentor Jenny Brundin and I had saved the project multiple times on a couple disks, and she was able to pull it up on her computer.
Speaking of Jenny, she was an absolute delight to work with. She taught me a great deal about audio and shared a little bit about her experiences working in radio. She is a wonderful mentor and was available anytime I wanted her help. I didn’t even have to ask! She enlightened me on the journalism world and it was a joy to learn from her.
I grasped organization better as well, since I had to juggle working on audio, crafting the written form and managing visuals to complete the project. The team helped me stay on track and push me along, which was definitely helpful.
So far, my favorite individual meeting at Next Gen Radio was with Selena on audio mixing. She explained in detail how it works and was incredibly patient. It was also inspiring to hear her speak about what she’s passionate about. She used metaphors (which helps me understand things a little better) and is very supportive about working with and teaching women in particular.
I think everyone on the team I met and worked with shared as much knowledge as they could in a week and that is irreplaceable. All of them being experts, I feel fortunate that they gave their time and skills.
Overall, I am so thankful to have been a mentee and can’t wait to continue onto future projects!
