Got a job, but I need your help

Go to school.

It sounds like your family will support you in any way possible to ensure you get an education.

In my four years of school, I was able to expand my social boundries as well as, more importantly, my mind. I had the opportunity to work in radio, television and print, and with each success, came more belief that I would some day be successful.

Working at a daily at 18 wouldn't give you the same level of satisfaction or pride or experience -- at least the kind of experience you need at that age -- in my opinion.

As much as I wish I had the opportunity to do what you've signed up to do at 18, looking back on what I would have missed, there's no way I'd give up the collegiate experience.

Besides, what if you get burned out after your first couple months and want to change fields ... are you ready to don the McDonald's visor?

 

Hold on folks:

Is there a college within 30-50k of your new job? Does your new job have a program to help pay tuition?

If so, perhaps working full time and getting all that experience while graduating from college in six years rather than four years isn't such a bad idea.

Of course, the social life thing miight suck for an 18 year old following that route.

 

Not to dissuade young The Rookie from choosing college, but I can tell you that your thesis isn't foolproof, and I'm one of the prosecution's leading exhibits.

I dropped out of school for something like three years in the 1990's because I was getting a lot of PT work from my first paper, one of the state's metros. I -- foolishly -- believed that by getting clips and making contacts, I wouldn't need to go back to school to get a decent full-time job, since I was just so damned good a writer.

Fast-forward three years, and to the surprise of nobody except myself, I'm no closer to a full-time job. So I bit the bullet and reapplied to my last school to, at long last, finish my degree and get back into the workforce.

Two weeks before I'm to return to school, I get a call from a college friend who works at a paper two hours away from where I live. They've got an opening in sports, and I should put in for it. And I thought about it for a little bit, even talked to the ME informally about it, but decided to not put in for it because I knew if I didn't return to school at that point, I never would. I have stupid pride like that.

And so I returned to school. Not sure that I learned anything, but I got good marks, so apparently I did. Either that or the world got a whole lot dumber in my time away. I'd bet on the latter myself, but whatever. After two years, I got my degree, completing a decade-long odyssey of medicority, procrastination and masturbating fantasizing about the girls in my classes. Clearly I was finally ready for what the world had for me.

Here's what it had for me: six months of unemployment, followed by a job at ... wait for it ... the very place that I could have had a job some two and a half years earlier.

My point for rookie? Two, actually:

1. Only you know your appropriate course of action. In this day and age, a college degree isn't a benefit anymore, it's almost as necessary to employment as proof that you can legally work in this country. But if you have a job offer, then maybe the experience in your case can make up for the lack of degree (it didn't in my case because I had a PT job; yours is FT, which changes the equation). Do you think you can get a much better job if you go to college? In most cases, you probably can. But there's exceptions.

2. No matter what decision you make, research and think and pray and whatever the heck out of it, then make it and hope for the best. I will warn you, though: Most people will tell you that even if you make a bad choice or two, you can recover from it in time. It's possible. It's also possible that a bad decision could really fuck you up in the long run, so make sure you're not pulling the trigger without informed consent (again, speaking from personal experience: made a choice to take a job that was probably out of my wheelhouse, and the damage my departure did to me may well have ended my shot at being a relevant journalist. not trying to be depressing [the other thread proves that I don't have to try], just throwing out an alternative perspective).

Good luck either way.

 

rookie,

I won't give you advice, but a prediction. You will work such long hours and have such little social life in that small town and put some much of your energy and effort in that weekly that after 2-3 years, you'll wish you had gone to school and you will wonder why you are working so hard for these folks and seeing so little in return.

So save your money and use it to pay for school when you are 20 or 21.

 

Mert - It isn't the degree that's the benefit, it is the experience.

Enjoy yourself these next four or five years. It truly is the most wonderful time of your life. Work hard, pursue your dreams, become a stringer, work at a paper part-time, but most of all, soak college up for all it is worth.

You've got the rest of your life to work. Go to college, stay on your parents' health plan, drink your face off on a Tuesday night, make out with a girl simply because she is there, survive on a daily sustenance of hot dogs and beer, go to bed at 3 a.m. and wake up at 11 and don't feel unproductive for doing it, enjoy winter break, read the books you'd never read unless someone was forcing you, etc, etc, etc.

Again: if you can afford to go to college, GO.

And don't look back. If you've got enough drive to consider taking a full time newspapering job at the age of 18, ,you've got enough drive to put yourself in position to get a much better job fresh out of college.

Again, there is no debate. You are young. Go to school.

GOOOO TOOOOO SCHOOOOOOL

 

The hell with the job. You'll be a better, brighter, more well-rounded person if you go to school. You can always get a job. What's the rush? School will open your eyes to other possibilities, as well.

 

Fucking rookies.

 

go to college.

many people will disagree with this sentiment but college is a time to grow into an adult. although it sounds like you would work your way through college as opposed to having the parents pay the bill, it should be a time to find yourself, try new things, meet similarly situated boys, girls, men and women and figure out what you really want to do with your life. you can write while in college so if it's writing you want, you won't be missing anything by passing up this job.

 

I would be one of two staffers.
I'm thinking about this:

* Take the job, stay for a year, get the experience and then hit up college.

My sister says, 'What's living life if we don't take chances?'

 

GO TO COLLEGE.

Learn something. Make friends. Bang girls. Camp out for tickets. Drink beer.

And, for fuck's sake, do not -- and I repeat -- do NOT just major in journalism. Double-major in journalism and something that actually has the potential to provide a reasonable salary someday. Journalism and business. Journalism and computer science. Journalism and drug dealing. Anything but simply journalism.

Believe me when I tell you that $25K is in not a reasonable salary in any way, shape or fucking form -- and if you take that piece of shit job in Bumfuck, you will spend the rest of your life desperately trying to climb into the middle class. Good luck ever buying a house or having a child. Hell, good luck trying to stay out of credit card debt.

You're staring at a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity here -- and it's not this God-awful job. It's college. If you still want to be a journalist after college, I promise you'll be able to find another shitty, low-paying, soul-sucking, thankless gig on which you can waste your life.

 

For love of God, go to college, give yourself more options in life. And you may find a field that you like better in doing so. And if you still want to be a journalist, write for the college paper or the college town's paper(s).