I Have A Dream...

That's right, I have a new life goal. I'm actually surprised that I've lived this long without one. The Penn State Daily Collegian. I was looking at it's webpage. It's beautiful, it's glorious. It's so unlike the Beacon that it isn't even funny. The Collegian is the real deal. The newspaper office is actually a building, a two-story building a short way from University Park campus. Outside there are three newspaper stands: New York Times, Washington Post, and the Collegian. (I have the picture taped to my desk.)

I watched clips from a documentary made about the Collegian, following it for a year. There are editorial offices, conference rooms, and great big newsrooms full of Macs. The people working there seem well-dressed, articulate, sharp. They seem to each be their own person, and they take reporting very seriously. The paper itself (I have a copy of Wednesday's on my bed) is well-written, sharp, and tells good news, from global to campus stories.

It's very competitive. During the third week of every semester, there are staff-writer try-outs. They sit everyone down, give them a headline concerning a current event and one hour, and the students have to write 500 words. That is how they decide who works for the Collegian. No portfolio, no prior experiance, no interview. Do or die.

It might be a little bit stupid for me to pursue this. At Behrend, I can be an editor from my sophomore year. I could build an extremely thick portfolio. It's even conceivable that I could be Editor-in-Cheif by my Senior year. Whereas I could go to main campus, never get accepted into the Collegian's staff, and my portfolio would come to a screeching halt my junior year. That doesn't look too good when you're trying to get a job.

But - I want to know. I want to know if I'm good enough. I want to know how far my talent and hard work can get me. And I just plain want it. I want to belong to something serious and important, something historical and prestigous. I want to work with other reporters and writers, people who have a global perspective. I want the big news, the big stories. I want the real thing. I want it so bad. So, I'm going for it. No fear, not in this lifetime. I'm going to write my butt off this year, snap up an open editing position next year, and read the paper (Times, Collegian, Beacon) every day of my life. I am going to become well-versed in everything that's going on everywhere, and I'm going to become a writing machine. I'm going to take history, science, politcal science courses. I'm going to learn how to think big and write well. And when that audition comes along in exactly two years, I will rip it up.

Hmm. I guess this makes me a journalism major.