College Happenings

Sometimes I go to the Univerity of Montana website and check out the journalism page. 

It usually depresses me. 

During my last semester of school I became really, really disillusioned with the J-school.  I went into the school with big dreams.  I thought I was a pretty good writer and I really had a heart for the news.  The J-school slowly sucked it out of me. 

Day after day I saw teachers pick their favorites and help guide them.  While I chose my favorite teachers, no one chose me.  It didn’t matter that I had good grades or put together study groups.  No teacher ever took an interest in me and my studies. 

That really frustrated me.  I began to grow very resentful of the faculty, and even the students that were clearly favored. 

I wasn’t alone in my feelings.  I remember a discussion one time with a group of my friends.  We were very hot one day because a student whose parents had donated money to the new school got introduced to the people from National Geographic.  This kid sucks ass as a photographer.  He’s not so great as a person either.  But the point is.  The faculty gave him special treatment because of his parents money. 

I guess school really does reflect real life. 

Today, I am especially down about school and my degree. 

This morning on Montana Today there was a segment on a kid I went to school with.  ( A Hotty) He went to Afghanistan this summer and wants to be a foreign correspondent.  I am sure he will go far. 

That is what I wanted to do.  I wanted to travel to Africa and the Middle East and report on wars and genocide.  Now I just get to watch other people do it.  The sad thing is not that I am not doing that.  But that the J-school made me doubt myself.  It made me think that dream wasn’t even worth trying for.  Because none of the teachers ever saw in me what I could see in myself.  I listened to them.  I thought if I am not good enough for Professor A or B then I am not good enough to do much.  I found myself looking for an easy way out.  I found myself interning at the Ravalli Republic instead of trying for the Dow Jones and going to California.  I look back and I am sad because I didn’t even try.  I went in to that school with high hopes and big dreams and I graduated feeling like I had made a huge mistake.  But now, I can see my big mistake wasn’t choosing journalism.  My mistake was that I stopped believing in myself and started listening to people that didn’t have a clue about who I was or who I could be. 

I don’t want to sound like I am blaming the J-school for me not having the job I thought I would.  My life took a different course for a lot of different reasons, and I am happy with what I have.  

But, sometimes, when I see other people going where I thought I would, I have to stop and think; I think that when it comes to journalism, I made some mistakes and then just gave up.