Who is still in the biz: Your college newspaper staff

I posted a small bit about this on another thread but it got me thinking, who on your college newspaper staff is still in the newspaper business?

I was on my college newspaper staff for two years. In that time, I was a reporter, sports editor, and, eventually, co-editor.

In that time, of the other editors and reporters I can remember, only me and one other guy are still working fulltime in newspapers. My co-editor is in PR. The editor we replaced is a professional drag queen. the previous semester's co-editors, one works for a software company and the other does a little freelance writing on the side, and is trying to get a teaching gig. He basically runs a salvage yard now. The editor when I started is now also in PR.

Included in the mix of section editors, photogs and others are some housewifes, who married well, another who fell ass backwards into family money when the shale boom hit. Some non-media business owners, some wedding photographers, lots of PR people, a couple of lawyers, a firefighter, some teachers.

I clearly didn't go to Mizzou, and excluding there and a couple of the other j-school heavyweights, what's your count?

On a side note, my GF was editor of her student newspaper. She says no one from her staff is still in the newspaper business. She got her masters at Ole Miss and excluding John T. Edge, she can only think of a couple of people there who are still at newspapers. She isn't sure though as they may have gotten caught up in Gannett craziness.

 

From my sports staff (from a college with no J-school), one guy is at SI and another started his own publication. One of the news guys is at Slate, but I haven't kept up as well with that part of the staff. That's all I can think of off the top of my head.

 

Great thread!

I'm only a year and a half removed from my college newspaper and am myself out of the business after a brief time as a sports writer in Effingham, Illinois. Didn't have the patience to put up with low wages and work myself up in the industry. Plus, I missed living in a big city.

Let's see...we have a reporter in Appleton, Wisconsin, a reporter in Kokomo, Indiana, an editor of a food magazine in St. Louis and a sports writer in Decatur, Illinois from my time there.

A lot of folks had the same idea as me and went into marketing or PR. The sports editor a few years ahead of me is a morning show producer/shock jock, which I guess could count as still being in the industry?

Oh, what a Mizzou education could have done for my career...

Our college paper did produce Bill Plaschke and Paige St. John, who has a Pulitzer in investigative reporting, both obviously well before my time.

 

I graduated nearly 10 years ago. Of the dozen or so people I worked closely with, none of us are still in journalism.

 

Of the hundreds I probably worked with in three years at a school paper in late 90s-early aughts, not a ton probably still in it, though I can think of a major political correspondent/editor, a music magazine editor, several AP reporters, a couple sports reporters with pretty good beats, a state political editor/reporter, and a crime reporter for a big paper in Florida.

 

It's been more than 20 years since I graduated and I've moved all over the continent and haven't kept in touch with most.

It would surprise me if many were still in the business. They weren't the sharpest, most ambitious bunch of folks I'd ever met and tended to throw up their hands and give up at the first sign of difficulty.

 

Our staff (at one of the more reputable student newspapers in the country) from about five years ago:

I was sports editor and still am in the industry.
The chief news editor is at a trade publication.
The editor in chief works for a large metro newspaper.
The managing editor just finished grad school after a year at a weekly.
The deputy managing editor is making more money than all of us combined at a different job.
The opinion editors never joined the field.
The photo editor left a newspaper to make twice as much doing landscaping.
The basketball beat reporter is covering college basketball for a small newspaper.
The football beat reporter is a regularly used stringer for a large metro newspaper.
The sports columnist is a full-time editorial aide at that same newspaper.
The football blogger is a social media editor at a major news organization.
The sports administration reporter is a capital news reporter for a small chain of area newspapers.
The city council reporter is a full-time reporter at an alt-weekly.
The student government reporter is a part-time blogger.
The student life reporter writes and edits for a niche magazine.
The design editor designs ads.

I don't think anyone else is in the industry.

 

That's a damn big staff for a student paper. Wow.

 

We had a staff of about 40, if you included people who copy edited twice a week or wrote an article a week or so.

 

Hmmm ... it's been about 20 years since I was at the Daily Iowan (no secret to anyone here who puts up with my Hawkeye fanboi-ness).

I haven't kept up with too many of them, but I know one guy still writes for the Chicago Tribune, and two of the photogs shoot for AP -- one of those has traveled around the world, including war zones in the Middle East and Afghanistan.

The two other photogs I worked with in college, last time I checked, aren't in the news biz but still make money shooting weddings, portraits, etc.

I've been privileged to work with great photographers throughout my career, and that streak began in college.

 

Been about 30 years, but just in sports alone: One has an NFL beat in the Bay area, one works for AP, one has helped turn a newsletter he started with his uncle into a major prep publication/website in this state and I am happy in Podunk.