Yesterday I shadowed a street reporter, and it was the best day of my professional career.
I met Kevin at 6:40 a.m. at the D train station at 125th St. and St. Nicholas Avenue. I had been in contact with him since the end of last week, and was looking forward to meeting him.
I liked him right away. He was older, seasoned and incredibly friendly. You could tell that even after years of reporting, he still found it fun, which is a quality I’m learning I really appreciate in reporters.
From the moment we stepped on the train, he started teaching me things. He gave me a run through all about how to deal with other reporters, how to interview, how to hide my notepad before I talk to someone. He even gave me my first New York Post reporter’s notebook, which is basically any basic spiral-bound reporter’s notebook you can buy in a drugstore, but to me, it was exciting. Plus, mine says New York Post on it.
We got off the train in Brooklyn, where we were going to the school of a boy who drowned Sunday afternoon on a school trip. Kevin asked me if I could navigate us to where we need to go, and thanks to my many years in Girl Scouts, I got us to the school no problem. Just to check to make sure we were going the right way, Kevin would stop street vendors or pedestrians and say “Hey boss, where is (enter street name)?” Right away he taught me that when I’m in a new area, strike up a rapport with street vendors, news agents or even homeless people. Often times they see or know things that other people take for granted, and are usually willing to help.
We get to the high school, fully expecting a media maelstrom, but we are the only ones away. So, with notebooks in hip pockets and badges tucked into shirts, we start casing the building. In about 20 minutes, after a few fruitless attempts to ask pedestrians if they work at the school or know the student, we find a teacher who heard about the accident.
It is she who informs us that there is another campus of the same high school in another are of Brooklyn, and he was a student there, not here.
We were sent to the wrong address.
After verifying with another employee that she hadn’t heard of any student from this location dying, we get the approval from the city desk to move locations. Kevin told me you always had to get approval, just to cover your back.
We jump in a cab and hightail it to Prospect Heights, where the correct high school is. How did we know we were right? There were TV trucks everywhere.
Playing catch up, Kevin tells me that street journalists usually watch each others backs. They won’t give up exclusives, but if there is information that everyone has access to, usually they will share.
It became obvious that there was definitely a sense of camaraderie amongst street reporters. Although everyone was working for their own publication, everyone knew each other and was friendly and helpful to one another. No one was completely on their own.
While Kevin starts talking to whoever he can find to catch up on what we missed, I start quickly transcribing our recording of the school chancellor into notes to send to the desk. After consulting with Kevin, he shows me it’s best to send exact quotes more often than not, as they are more useful than just paraphrasing things for the writer.
We send the notes to the desk, and start waiting around for when students would come out of the building. It is during that time that one of our main competitors, who we were hanging out with (and is very sweet), broke the story on the kid’s name. That is when Kevin taught me that no matter how friendly journalists are with each other, you hang on to your exclusive, because you worked hard for that.
We phone in the name, and wait for students to leave for early dismissal. Let it be known that I got to hang out with seasoned reporters from the New York Post, the Daily News, DNA and the Wall Street Journal, while they smoked cigarettes and I munched on a granola bar.
As it got closer to noon, a student told us that the school was pretty much empty, because it was graduation today. It was then that we would go ask any young person who hung around the building whether they went to the student’s high school (there were four high schools housed in one building.)
Kevin told me earlier that day to always keep an eye on the other journalists, and keep up with what they are doing, especially if they are quickly taking notes.
And I got to put that in use today.
One journalist, who we were friendly with, said he was going to talk to some girls, and if he pulled his notebook out, we should come over.
I was the first one to notice that the notebook was out, and trotted over, recorder and notebook in hand.
Soon, everyone was all over this girl, as she was the first person we had encountered who actually knew the victim, albeit not very well.
It wasn’t long until TV cameras were on her too. As soon as we gleaned everything we could from her, it was back to my transcribing my notes, which were luckily very good as I had gotten there quickly and hadn’t missed much.
After a brief problem with connecting to the internet, we sent off our notes from the student to the desk, and continued playing the waiting game.
Sadly, it never picked back up from there. We weren’t able to get an address for the victim or find a student on the trip, so I was sent home at about 4 p.m.
When I got home, I cleaned up, changed into a sundress and took a train to midtown, because I was invited to a Post party by the managing editor, Lauren, who helped get me my internship.
It was a retirement party, and she introduced me to everyone we made contact with. I met the publisher, the editor in chief, the director of Page Six, another managing editor and countless staffers. It was my first chance to meet other employees at the paper, and they were so welcoming to me.
Lauren and I stayed for about an hour and a half, and then I took the train home, where I flopped down on the bed, and didn’t wake up until 7 a.m. this morning. Best sleep of my life.
And, to my delight, I got to wake up to a nice byline for the story I worked on yesterday. All in a day’s work.
Who’s name is that?
Let me just zoom in for you
By THIS KID!
Here’s a link to the full story, just in case I didn’t spam you with it enough:
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/brooklyn/drown_teen_off_limits_H9Yy2T5FDHdXZIoIJBPsUP
Jensen Werley Media 