Advice on entering the Journalism field

I'd up it to four words.

Get the fuck out.

This isn't a career anymore; it's a lottery. It's 80k journalists fighting for 40k jobs, and by time this kid gets out it will be 100k fighting for 25k.

It's like saying you really, really want to be an actor or a singer. You might be one of the few who make it, but planning on it is recklessly throwing away your future.

 

Don't do it. Not worth it. No money, too much stress. I could make more money working construction and I'd get a nice tan and a great workout every day.

 

Worked for Peter.

 

Full story: http://www.forbes.com/2009/04/06/journalism-media-jobs-business-media-jobs.html

EDIT: I love this line:

Costs are up too. The average price for graduate school and living expenses has reached $31,000 per year. This despite earnings for journalists with a graduate degree averaging just $40,000 in 2007 ($10,000 more than for those with just bachelor's degrees).

 

I probably know a dozen kids in journalism school, and I haven't convinced a single one to give it up, because you can't tell a teenager or a young 20-something anything.

I also know about a dozen who I tried to convince to get out and are now graduated, and only a couple are employed and all wish they'd listened to me.

 

And I laughed about it when I first saw the movie.

But after all the bull shit it sounds like a great idea.

 

Yeah well i suppose the answers to my questions have been answered well how should i say it? bluntly...lol

And no im not going to go out ranting and raving about how "I'm special and dfferent" lol. Nor am i going to argue with you guys, because a person who asks a question, gets real answers, then argues them....not the brightest person out there

Perhaps i was a little harsh on CSUF, as many of you have told me the school is not as important as i once thought it was.

 

And if you bothered to find out about it, you would have found that CSUF has produced some quality people and quality journalists.

Pretty simple rule regarding school is "If I could do better, financially and Academics-wise . . . I would be."

Sort of helps a person to focus on their studies instead of acting like earning a college degree is something to be embarrassed about.

 

I'll be contrarian and say that school can definitely matter, as there is a very well-oiled Syracuse Mafia, Northwestern Mafia, Missouri Mafia, etc., etc., out there. Now, a lot of that is self-selecting - ambitious people tend to gravitate to those places in the first place. I was very disappointed in my journalism education simply because I felt that my school placed very low expectations on its students. I'd go to the same place over again, because I met my wife and my best friends there, but if my own son or daughter ever wants to go into this (journalism, I mean, not necessarily sports writing), I'll recommend going into the best school he can get into, starting at Harvard and working on down.

That being said ...

There are plenty of wildly, wildly successful journalists who don't have an Ivy or UCLA/Berkeley-caliber pedigree. Don't roll your eyes about where you're going to school. You haven't earned that right yet. Let's get through a semester first without dropping out, OK? There are a lot of people on here who went to a lot of different styles of schools, but they are proud of that degree hanging on the wall. So no one really wants to hear a 17-year-old acting too big for his college britches, you know? Just some friendly advice moving forward.

 

A former intern/call-taker at my former paper is a freshman majoring in journo. I warned him over and over...finally, I think I've helped talk him into choosing another major.

 

I've tried to do the same thing ... only problem is when they quit it's a pain in the ass finding someone else to do the grunt work!

But to be serious about it, it's hard to have college kids come through, knowing that you can't recommend in good conscious that they stay in the business. We have one college kid who strings for my place who is truly talented. He graduates at the end of the year and if anyone has an opening then (insert maniacal laughter here) let me know because this kid will hit the ground at a full sprint, wherever he ends up. It won't be here, because I don't see us having a spot for him. I think he's just starting to grasp how tough it's going to be.

And we have a couple other college stringers who aren't in this guy's league -- if I didn't think I'd come off like a total a-hole, I'd tell them to start thinking about something else to do. Don't want to be an a-hole ... and, of course, we need them to answer the phones and cover games!

I like the analogy someone else made to pursuing a career as an actor or singer. Klasky, follow the advice of many who've posted here ... pick a different field and write on the side. Local papers and even some Web sites are always looking for freelancers. There are a lot of people in sports journalism who do still have jobs but are seeing the harsh realities of the business, i.e., that there's not a lot of upward mobility and that the jobs we're fortunate enough to have could end up on the chopping block soon. Same goes for other businesses these days, I realize, but most other fields aren't struggling for survival the way newspapers are. Good luck.

 

One word of advice about entering journalism: DON'T.

Even if 200 of us have said it, it bears repeating.