Students with top-notch technology skills have to be flexible, too, or they face a tough job search among online news sites. At least that's the message from several online editors and news directors who gathered recently at the Poynter Institute.
"I think it’s a question of attitude and flexibility," said Scott Hersey, editor of
MaineToday.com. "Rotating students through various mediums would help [to get them ready for the professional world]. They wouldn’t be there long enough to become experts in all three fields [TV, print, and online], but it would help in terms of a basic shared understanding, which would, could, or should lead to more flexibility."
Suzanne Levinson, online managing editor of
Herald.com in Miami, agrees that there are some particular skills required for work in converged media, including speed. "But it’s mostly an openness to doing the same story in different ways. That’s the true challenge," Levinson said.
Mark Blanchard, online editor of
The Florida Times-Union, is amazed at what he
doesn't see happening on college campuses. "Most college newspaper sites don’t try to do what a lot of professional papers are doing online... trying to be more interactive, add more multimedia, etc.," Blanchard said. His staff will soon start a collaboration with the University of North Florida to get college students to attend area activities and report them online with pictures, text, and perhaps audio and video.
"Getting kids exposed to and learning how to do all these new methods is key," Blanchard said. "Let them learn how to tell stories in new ways. That will force them to learn new skills and to be more employable."
Seth Carlson, news producer at
Boston.com, is only a few years out of college himself, but points to great writing skills, HTML skills, and prowess with Photoshop and Illustrator as "enormously valuable."
"Someone who has just one, or even two out of three, is less likely to find a job at a site like Boston.com, where the compactness of the staff demands everyone be a jack-of-all-trades," Carlson adds.
[Convergence Chaser note: This is Barbara Hipsman's first piece as a member of the Collective. A longtime journalist and now a professor at Kent State University, she'll be bringing you news from the world of convergence education.]
