BLUEFIELD — Click here for video
Students from Graham and Bluefield high schools received a four-hour-long orientation to a trio of local communications centers that included stops at the WVVA-TV studios, the Bluefield Daily Telegraph and the studios of Adventure Radio Group.
“I think it’s awesome,” Forrest Yates, 17, from North Tazewell, Va., a GHS junior said. He added that he had been interviewed twice on television, but Wednesday marked the first time he had seen television from a behind-the-scenes perspective.
“We have a big event planned for you,” Samantha Perry, managing editor of the Daily Telegraph said.
“When I started working at the newspaper, we had no Internet. You had a 24-hour news cycle and one product to carry the news of the day. Things started changing. Now, we have a morning paper, an on-line product, a video component and more.”
As she explained how editors decide what will appear in the newspaper, she asked a question as to why an editor would select a specific story to appear on the front page. Hasan Muzaffer, 16, a junior at GHS answered quickly: “Because that’s what gets the most attention.”
“Are you holding up page A-10?” Justin Freund, 17, a student at BHS asked. Perry looked at the paper for a moment, responded that it was page one, and started to resume her discussion, when Freund said that page A-10 of Wednesday’s newspaper featured a photo of his father, Drew Freund.
The 32 students participating in the Greater Bluefield Chamber of Commerce’s Youth Leadership Program, proved to be an inquisitive group.
“What is the most read-section of the paper?” Molly Lovern, 16, a sophomore at BHS asked. Perry and Darryl Hudson, Daily Telegraph publisher explained that crime, vehicular accidents, fires and/or natural disasters often lead the page. “Sadly, a lot of time, that’s what people want to read,” Perry said.
“That’s what keeps the paper alive,” Lovern observed.
Before she could get rolling again, Tori Akers, 17, a junior at GHS, asked Perry what got her started in the newspaper career. “What made you decide on this?” she asked.
Perry explained that she didn’t major in journalism in college, but after she graduated, she took a job as a reporter, “and I loved it,” she said. “Six months later, I was Lifestyles Section editor.”
Lisha Miller, co-chair of the Youth Leadership group with Farron Sneed, asked Perry about the Prerogative magazine. Perry responded that the Daily Telegraph publishes the magazine, and Hudson picked up and told the group about the other products the newspaper publishes. Hudson demonstrated the newspaper’s on-line products. Staff photographer Jon Bolt explained how he has to drive to a mountaintop to “drop-box” digital images into the system from remote locations.
Tashell Mitchell, 16, a junior at GHS asked a provocative question. “With the TV, what you see is what you get,” Mitchell said. “How do you report what you see without embellishing it?”
Perry and Hudson both offered responses to Mitchell’s question, before the students took a tour of the newspaper that included an “Extra” press run that included photographs of the students gathering at the newspaper for the start of their tour as well as their names and the program’s goal.
“There’s the back of my head,” Daniel Tolliver, 17, a junior at BHS said as he watched the video of the students arriving at the newspaper. Tolliver said he is interested in a career in business, but said that he found the media very interesting.
— Contact Bill Archer at barcher@bdtonline.com
