Personal Statement – Broadcast News Program
Ever since I was young, I have been fascinated by broadcast news. As a child, I would sit down with my parents every night at dinner and watch the people in the “box” cover everything going on the world. While I knew I didn’t understand much of it at the time, I felt like I was witnessing something important, and learning about what was going on in the world. As I got older, I learned more about what it meant to be a broadcast journalist, and began to understand the hard work and dedication that goes into making a piece of broadcast news. In high school, I volunteered to report for the school’s news radio station, reporting on everything that mattered in my school and community.
It took me awhile to focus on journalism as a dedicated subject; at first, my father wanted me to study business, so I went to community college as a business major. Between my lack of enjoyment for the field of business, and a journalism internship my mother arranged for me at a local Beijing TV station, I rediscovered my love for broadcast journalism. Spending a month shadowing a senior journalist there, I learned so much, and actually saw every step of getting a news story to air. I absolutely loved being there, and could not think of anything else I’d rather do; to that end, I changed my major to Broadcast News once I transferred to San Francisco State University. Currently, this is my final year at SFSU, where I will graduate with a degree in Broadcast Electronic Communication Art, with an emphasis on News.
I have interned at KTSF, the largest Asian news agency in the Bay area, learning even more about the field of broadcast news. Here, I spent four days a week writing news stories, arranging interviews over the phone, and assembling news packages; I adored every minute of it, and this made me understand my desire to become a reporter. The limitations in time and resources that often come with TV news production requires broadcast journalists to be creative in their presentation of the news, and I am positive this is the next step for my career. Though English is not my first language, I relish the opportunity to take on the challenge of this summer internship and prove my worth as a journalist.
