Student with a question

Very small.

Even if someone in a white trench coat tapped me on the shoulder and moved me to the big national daily near me, I'd still have the same mentality that clips are king.

 

I think what you find sometimes, though, is that people gravitate toward "their own."

If you have a power structure full of Syracuse and Northwestern J-school grads, they're going to tend to look harder at the pedigree of an applicant.

 

shottie - i don't give a shit if someone even comes from my part of the country, much less the same U i spent time at.

 

Good. More editors should be like that. And I'm sure it becomes less and less important (school pedigree) as your career progresses. But it opens up early doors. Schools like NU and Missouri probably have awesome career services departments with job postings, internships, etc., etc.

It's also a self-selecting group. People who go to those schools to study journalism are fairly serious to begin with. They would have been good even at Podunk County Community College.

 

You might be right. But if you aren't, that's part of the problem, that generalization.

I was plenty serious about my career coming out of little Shippensburg State College.

I didn't even use phrases like "plenty serious" back then.

 

Places like NU and Missouri, I think, push their students into loftier expectations. They're learning from professors who worked at the NY Times, Newsweek, the WSJ, etc.

The first newspaper I worked at out of college was larger than any that anyone in our J-department at Small College U ever worked at. When I landed at a 90,000-circ a year later and came back to homecoming, they were absolutely astounded. A year earlier, I had been highly encouraged to apply to the 10,000 circulation paper in town. Think that happens at Northwestern?

 

Well, considering I got my start at Podunk County Community College, I resemble your earlier remark!

Seriously, though, I think my approach may be a byproduct of my background. Yes, I went to the university with the Big Time J School near me, but I majored in English. Yes, I spent time on the Big Time Daily School Paper, but I also was managing editor of one of the niche pubs.

Thus, I can cast my net a little differently from other editors. Doesn't mean I won't look at someone who went to Big Time J School. It just means that that's just one place I'll look.

The first time I ever ran a hiring process, the guy I picked went to a smallish school that may or may not have had a journalism program. However, he had clips from an internship at a twice weekly paper and from a freelance gig at a small or medium-sized daily. I found out later that when I was going to leave my shop for a desk gig at a daily, my boss called him to ask if he wanted my job. Obviously, he was an effin' stud.

 

mizzou grad: best hire i ever made for an entry level sports writing position.

uppity little d-iii in the PNW grad: best hire i ever made for an experienced sports beat writer gig.

some private school in upstate NY grad: best hire i ever made for an ASE sports gig.

mizzou grads: two of the poorest news writers i've ever watched bumble their way through the workday.


i don't think it's an exact science.