KOMU Reporter Shadow Experience

For my reporting shift, I shadowed Jamal Andress. Upon arriving at the station, I was greeted by Jen Reeves who held a story meeting to discuss potential stories in the coverage area. Jamal came prepared with several story ideas but we were ultimately sent to cover a press conference from Govenor Jay Nixon in California, Missouri (Maniteau County). Nixon was covering his plan for creating jobs in Missouri. After creating a story map, Jamal decided to approach the story using unemployment data to analyze how this plan may / may not help the economy.

Jamal immediately emphasized the importance of time management as the most valuable thing he has learned at the station. It is important to immediately begin thinking about the story, making phone calls and leaving messages if you cannot get a hold of anyone, and know what shots you may need. At the end of the day, you need to have a VOSOT done for the 5 newscast and a package for the 6 newscast. You need to watch interview times, travel times, editing time, writing time, and remember to leave room for error. Computers only capture and import at one speed and you need to think about the time it takes to do this.

Before we left the newsroom, we filled out the assignment form. Regularly you would fill it out on the computer in the room where you checkout equipment but Stacey and Jen were working on creating a new form that they had Jamal fill it out by hand. The assignment form helps keep track of what stories people are doing, allows the producers to know what people are out on assignments, and keep track of equipment. If something is lost or broken, the assignment form allows the newsroom to track who had what last. If you have any problems, you should always call and talk to producers.

Jamal also took time to research before we left. He was even was meticulous about fact checking by calling contacts from websites to ask where the information came from. Once we got background information, we left early to California Missouri, interviewing the local mayor about job economy in the city who gave us other contacts to reach. We got b-roll and used the time before Nixon's speech to get some video and local opinions for the story. Since Jamal narrowed his focus, it was easier to know what he wanted to film.

Once we got back, Jamal immediately notified the producers and began getting his video from the camera to Avid as it takes time to import. He used sub-clipping to select pieces from Nixon's Speech rather than taking time to import it all as it saved time to convert the video. To subclip, you mark your in and out points in the source video and use the clip browser to create a new clip with just that portion of video. While the video was importing, Jamal then wrote a web story.
            Although Jamal did not use a graphic for his story, he showed me how to request one in iNews. The producers have to create one and it is important to do it early so they have time to do it. It is important to write what you exactly want. They will create a video and put it in a bin in Media Management. You can then use the video to insert into your story.

If you are covering a complicated story, it is important to use the web story as a way to provide the accurate depth for people to understand. You can clear up stories aired using the online site. And whenever possible Jamal prefers to use face-to-face conversation as you can ask people to demonstrate what they mean to clear up confusion. Whenever someone seems to be talking at a complex level, he always stops and tells the person to explain slowly and so anybody can understand.

Working in Avid is simple but you need to always check in your bins and work. Under file while in Avid, click on “check in open bins.” If you click "check in all bins" it will check in every bin in the day folder and take awhile.

Anytime you interview someone, go somewhere, or reference a specific link on our website, you need to use a super. In our case, we were told the governor did not need a super, as people knew who he was. But to create a super, you do it in iNews at the beginning of what you need supered. You use Deko Select to fill out the information. Unless your clip is shorter than 5 seconds, a super should at least remain up for that amount of time.

Other forms useful that students may need to use are the gas reimbursement forms and the hotel forms. If you go somewhere with your own car for the station, keep all receipts and you will get reimbursed. If you need to travel overnight, you can also get reimbursed for travel expenses. This was especially useful to cover the Joplin tornado.

At the end of the day, Jamal told me he wished he would have known the importance of knowing that you will never be perfect in this job. You can get ahead by staying at the station over breaks. He noted David Earl. He is a student like us, but chose to stay over summers and breaks and has been able to get the best experience out of KOMU by effort, passion, and dedication. Now, while in school, he is a co-anchor known by the community.

This shift is what we are training to do at Mizzou. It is the basis and fundlemental shift to test what this career is all about.