Skip to main content

What It's Like Being a Student Reporter





Hi everyone! Welcome to my blog site "The Life of a Student Reporter." My name is Alexis Pastore, I am currently a third year Telecommunications - News major at the University of Florida. I was born and raised in Tampa, Florida and come from a family of five.

Going to college has been one of the most scariest yet best decisions I have ever made, but with that being said there is a lot of work that comes with it. Being a college student alone can be extremely tough. You go through major life transitions such as living on your own to finding out how "adulting" really is. But on top of that, I am also a reporter for the on-campus news station, WUFT News. We are the local PBS affiliate for the North Central Florida region and broadcast as far as Jacksonville to Orlando. On a weekly basis, I pitch, report and edit stories for our nightly newscast called First at Five and do News in 90 segments for our sister station, WRUF. So not only do I have to balance the courses needed for my bachelor's degree but I also have a full-time position working for the newsroom. Sounds easy right?

Well just like any other student, and reporter for that matter, I have a lot of ups and downs. Through this blog I hope to share with you some of my tips, struggles and accomplishments during my time as a student reporter. I hope you enjoy my journey as much as I do. In the meantime, please feel free to check out some of the work I have already done on my personal website/online portfolio here. Let me know what you think or if there are any story topics you'd like to see covered.

Thank you and Go Gators!


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Let Me Introduce Myself...

I'm going to take a second and break from our tradition programming (aka blog posts) to take a step back and properly introduce myself...  For those that are just now tagging along to read my blog posts, I would like to say hi! I know I did a brief introduction a few months ago but I would like to give a more in-depth bio about myself that I never got the chance to do.  (Don't worry, I'm wearing shorts :) ) My name is Alexis Pastore. I am a 21-year-old fourth-year telecommunication major with a specialization in news and a concentration in sports management at the University of Florida. I was born and raised in Tampa, Florida, and grew up with a passion for sports, sharing stories and helping those around me.  I first found my love for broadcast journalism and news when I joined my high school's TV production program. There, I learned how to film, edit and write for newscasts, feature stories, public service announcements and music videos.  Then once I
2 comments
Read more

Internship Hunt

As this semester is coming to a close that means it is time to get things ready for the summer. As I mentioned, I will be studying abroad in Italy for the month of May. But once I get back to the states, I am hoping to have an internship lined up. While this semester has been tough enough as is being both a student and student reporter, trying to find and apply for an internship has been quite the process. I have been trying to keep my options open but I have found it difficult to find something that will fit with my schedule and my personal desire. I have applied to stations both in Gainesville as well as my hometown of Tampa, Florida. At least a handful of resumes have been sent out, cover letters have been drafted, applications have been filled out and yet I still find myself in a place of uncertainty. Through this process, I, unfortunately, have had many more negative moments than positive. The biggest negative so far is that no one has gotten back to me yet. I am less than t
Post a Comment
Read more

Please Don't Make Me Think... Literally and Metaphorically

Recently, I finished reading Don't Make Me Think by Steve Krug and I was relieved to know that a lot of what I have been taught and told to do through my journalism and telecommunication classes at the University of Florida fall very much in line with what Krug has suggested one should do when it comes to designing a website or software program. At the end of the day, our message in the newsroom is simple and I’m sure Krug would agree, don’t make the viewers think, do the thinking for them. As someone pursuing news, I have been constantly told to keep news features and packages short and sweet, to include enough information to make a story complete but don’t include too much where it’ll overwhelm someone, plus to make everything as streamline as possible. Of course, this all sounds so confusing and contradictory at first, but I think Krug did a great job overall of explaining how one can manage to accomplish all those tasks without overcomplicating the process through his boo
Post a Comment
Read more