Kruse placed first in the Hearst Broadcast News National Championships in New York City June 8-12. She earned a $5,000 prize and a Hearst medallion, and won an additional $1,000 prize for Best Use of Radio for News Coverage in the semifinal round of competition. Kruse was one of five finalists in radio from across the nation to compete. In her own words, Kruse describes her experience.

Brandi Kruse

I was thrilled after being selected to compete in the 2009-2010 Hearst championships in New York City, and honored to represent the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. The four radio finalists that joined me absolutely represented the best of the best in broadcast journalism and I had a blast getting to know the people behind the voices I had been hearing throughout the year.

The first day was a whirlwind as we checked into our fabulous hotel — the Jeremiah Essex House — and met the rest of the competitors, judges and members of the Hearst Foundation. Tuesday nigh was all business after getting our assignment from the judges. We were to report a story about security in New York City following 9/11 and the failed bombing in Times Square. It was a fantastic assignment and I immediately got to work looking for a human angle to drive the story.

I left the hotel early Wednesday morning in search of a street vendor named Duane Jackson who had alerted police to the suspicious (Nissan) Pathfinder parked in Times Square, which the county later learned had been wired to explode. After finding and interviewing Mr. Jackson, I had found my angle. My final story reflected the importance of public vigilance in keeping the city safe.

The awards ceremony took place Friday night at the unbelievable Hearst Tower. Following a wonderful reception and dinner, I was honored to have been selected as the broadcast radio news champion. It was an unforgettable experience and I cannot thank the Hearst Foundation enough for making our week in New York a memorable one, and for recognizing the work and talent of college journalists across the country! Receiving the Hearst Award was the highlight of my college career and reflects the outstanding faculty and staff we are lucky enough to have at the University of Nebraska.

Mitch Smith is a journalism major who will begin his second year at UNL in August. Originally from Overland Park, Kan., Smith was the winner of Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof’s annual Win-A-Trip contest. Smith, who had never left the United States before, was selected from nearly 900 applicants based on his entry essay.

Smith spent 12 days reporting with Kristof in four African countries in May, covering issues ranging from conservation to maternal health to education. While in Africa, he filed a daily blog post for the Times. You can read his entries at http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/author/mitch-smith/.

Mitch with new-found friends at a mud-hole on Republic of Congo’s Highway No. 1. The truck behind them had been stuck for the last month.

When I was checking in for my flight to Libreville, Gabon, the ticket agent politely asked one of my traveling companions, “Where the hell is that?”

There I was, totally out of my league, standing in the middle of one of the world’s busiest airports, and the person giving me my boarding pass didn’t have a clue where I was going.

If you, like the geographically challenged airline employee, aren’t familiar with Gabon, don’t feel too bad. It’s a relatively wealthy West African nation slightly larger than Nebraska in area but a little smaller in population.  It gained modest notoriety as a host site for Survivor and received some coverage for setting more than 10 percent of its land aside as national parks.

But aside from a few old National Geographic articles, the CIA World Factbook and clips from that ridiculous CBS reality show, I really didn’t know much more about where I was going than that ticket agent did.

I was born in Omaha, grew up outside Kansas City and returned to Nebraska for college.  Driving through the Midwest, I have paid an admission fee to see a five-legged cow, marveled at a cliff with five presidents’ faces carved on the side and spent hours wondering why I have to go through Missouri and Iowa to get to Lincoln when my home state of Kansas borders Nebraska in the first place.

But spending 12 days traveling overland from Libreville through the Republic of the Congo and into the Democratic Republic of the Congo put the five-legged cow and the rest of my Midwestern roadside adventures to shame.

In Africa, I saw camps of the purportedly dangerous “Ninja” rebels who were unarmed and underfed. I encountered six-foot-deep muddy gorges on Congo’s National Highway No. 1 that had ensnared some trucks for more than a month.

And, perhaps most poignantly, I watched a pair of teenagers in a remote village tell me of how they dreamed of attending college and of the hunger that gnawed at their bodies. Their story made my heart sink when I walked into the Selleck dining hall on the first day of my summer class, making me wonder why I had access to a university education and a buffet of endless food when those two teens struggled for both.

Because I had never left the United States before, much of my experience seemed surreal at the time. Things that would be illegal (14-year-olds having children with adults) or unthinkable (a swarm of bats flying out of the roof of a hospital) back home coexisted alongside cell phones and friendly locals. Some parts of Africa were uncomfortably foreign, but always nearby were things that felt not unlike Lincoln or Kansas City.

It was that human side of Africa that transformed my perspective on the world and on my life. I hope to use that fresh outlook to my advantage as I return to my comparatively tame life in the States. But even more, I think this trip transformed the way I look at a story and at journalism.

For years, I had wanted an opportunity to practice “real” journalism and to cover global issues for a wide audience. I was frustrated with the seeming insignificance of things like the investigative project I wrote for my high school newspaper about crosswalks.

This summer, I got the chance to cover those big-picture issues. I learned what I do well, what I need to work on and what it’s like to have my work read by thousands of discerning eyes while writing on tight deadlines and no sleep.

Now I can come back to school and work on making those improvements and finishing my degree. But I feel I do so as a much different person than I was when that ticket agent asked just where we were going.

My ideas about what is important in this world and what journalism can accomplish have changed, and I know that will help dictate where I go from here.

And, hey, if nothing else, I now know where Libreville is in case any other curious airline employees inquire.

Mijoe Sahiouni

Discovering what one wants to do after college graduation can be tough. As a double major in journalism and theater, Mai Mijoe Sahiouni wasn’t sure about her career goals — until she participated in UNL’s UCARE project. Now she has a clear goal in mind that allows her to pursue both her passions.

UCARE — the Undergraduate Creative Activities and Research Experiences program — supports undergraduates who work with faculty on such activities. Funded by the Pepsi Endowment and Program of Excellence, UCARE grants support most students for two years.

The first year focuses on learning by doing; the student assists the faculty member in his or her current research or creative activity project. In the second year, the student works independently on a project with the faculty member serving as a mentor.

UCARE project combines theater and advertising skills

Sahiouni, a senior at UNL, is one of many undergraduates who have participated in the program. Sponsored by faculty member Juliana Hagemeier, Sahiouni spent her first year in the UCARE program as assistant to the general manager of the Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film. During this time, Sahiouni used many of the advertising and journalism skills she had learned in the classroom.

“Basically, I did everything. I wrote press releases, created a marketing plan for a fundraising gala and arranged housing for guest audiences,” she said.

Mijoe Sahiouni met Dick Cavett during her UCARE internship

In her second year, Sahiouni conducted research on audience development for the Nebraska Repertory Theatre while she worked as the marketing associate for the theater.

Hagemeier described Sahiouni’s work as exceptional.

“She excels in each of these qualities — diligence, organization, strong interpersonal skills and the ability to multitask.”

But Sahiouni also has other admirable attributes,  Hagemeier said.

“She has a personable manner, a sparkling personality that charms youth and adults alike, is particular in her artistic choices and has boundless energy.

Academic and career goals come together

One of UCARE’s goals for undergraduates is that they identify academic and career interests, and that’s exactly what Sahiouni has done. The UCARE program gave her the opportunity to explore both of her majors, theater and advertising, and allow them to interact with one another.

Academically she found a way to build off each major, using what she learned in one to help her with the other. UCARE also helped her experience theater and advertising in a professional manner.

Hoping to graduate August 2010, Sahiouni plans to use her public relations skills in the entertainment industry.

During its 10 years, the UCARE program has helped thousands, said Troy Fedderson of University Communications.

“Since the start of the program in 2000, more than 2,500 undergraduates and 800 faculty members have participated in the program,” he said.

For Sahiouni, it’s provided not only an added advantage to her undergraduate education but also a way to figure out what she wants to do after she graduates.

Rachel Albin

During spring semester, 13 students were enrolled in the first half of a yearlong depth report on Bolivia — but one of the students was never in class.

The “absent” student was Rachel Albin, a news-editorial and Spanish major who plans to graduate in May 2011 and aspires to become a bilingual journalist. Albin was studying abroad in Mexico and participated in the first semester of NEWS 401 via Skype, a software application that allows users to make calls to other Skype users over the Internet for free — even international calls. Calls can be either audio only or audio and video, depending on whether the computers being used have cameras.

Through the cameras on her computer and on the instructor’s laptop in the Andersen Hall classroom, Albin was able to see the class and interact with the students and the teachers, Luis Peon-Casanova and Carla Kimbrough.

“It has been a great opportunity, but this experience is not like sitting in a classroom,” Albin said.

“There are 12 people in the classroom, and Luis opens his laptop and has my face on the screen. The class has to remember to turn me and pass me around so I can see who is talking and what is going on. If there is a PowerPoint or a presentation, it works best if they send me a link so I can follow along on my own computer instead of trying to read the screen.”

Although this is a non-traditional way to deliver education, Peon-Casanova thinks it has advantages.

“I got my master’s over the computer, and the experience was very strong. The difference is that you have to be disciplined and do all the work yourself,” he said. “It is more of a student-learning environment instead of the teacher. I think that way, your learning can lead to be more active because you have more of an ownership in what you do.”

Peon-Casanova likes using Skype because “it is so transparent, and it works so well.”

A passionate interest in Bolivia

The J school announced last fall that it would undertake a depth report about Bolivia as part of a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Peon-Casanova and Kimbrough asked students to apply for the class, and Albin was eager to be part of the project. She had wanted to visit Bolivia since she learned about the nation in a high school Spanish class.

But, in her application, Albin had to explain that she was going to be abroad during the first semester of the course. She told the faculty that she would do anything to be included and suggested Skype as an option.

Kimbrough and Peon-Casanova decided to make it work, and Albin and the rest of the students in the class spent the spring doing research about Bolivia’s geography, history and natural resources.

“I wasn’t totally confident that having Rachel appear via Skype would work, but it worked beautifully,” Kimbrough said. “Rachel has been an enormous asset to the class and has taken on one of the key topics — coca. I believe Rachel has a firm hold on the topic. Because of this experience with Rachel, I would be more likely to try this method again.”

Peon-Casanova said one primary focus of the class is to help students learn to approach journalism as “an integrated subject where you have to be able to interview, take your own pictures, broadcast and market your stories. Even if a student is primarily a writer, he or she is going to have to be versatile in different media in order to be successful.”

Bolivia’s situation is also unusual

The way the course is delivered to Albin isn’t the only unusual thing about the project. Bolivia itself is at a unique moment in history.

For the first time in its 470 years, Bolivia is led by an indigenous head of state, Evo Morales. Europeans have previously governed the nation, where 65 percent of the population is indigenous.

After studying about Bolivia during the spring and developing potential sources there, students visited the nation in June.  They’ll spend the fall semester writing stories about what they found and creating a magazine and website. They may even develop educational materials to use in classrooms. They are still determining how to market the material they plan to produce.

Albin said she appreciated being able to take the Bolivia class via Skype because her experience in Mexico has been irreplaceable. She has improved her Spanish for her trip to Bolivia, but she also gained a stronger Latin American perspective.

Despite the unorthodox teaching and learning method, Albin and her instructors are happy she was able to be part of the depth reporting team.

“I’m excited to have Rachel along,” Peon-Casanova said.

Allison Busch

Imagine being given an assignment on something you know nothing about. A project so demanding that it’s a government matter. Now imagine being a sophomore in college and having this assignment rest in your hands.

That was the daunting task facing junior advertising major Allison Busch in fall 2009.

That semester, Busch was an intern at the Global Innovation and Strategy Center, one of many sectors of the United States Strategic Command based in Omaha. The task? Figure out how to protect the commercial industry’s satellites from electromagnetic interference. In simple terms, this means stopping the disruption of satellite signals that are used around the world.

Teams take on STRATCOM challenges

Each year United States Strategic Command — STRATCOM — puts together several teams of people from different skill areas. The five members of the team are given one semester to address a problem facing STRATCOM.

The team’s goal was to create a report that contained suggestions on how to solve the disruption of the satellite signals. This report would then be presented to the students’ supervisors, and ultimately, to a four-star general.

Busch and her team began digging into the research.

“We had to dive in head first looking up information about satellites,” she said. “We were dealing with experts who had been in the field for 30 years.”

Busch’s colleague, Carrie Lacy said, “It’s definitely a fast-paced research environment where you are expected to provide real-life solutions to be used by the Department of Defense.”

Not everyone trusts the government

In addition to their heavy research load, the interns faced a challenge when workers in the commercial industry often were leery of working with anyone affiliated with the government.

“There is a trust issue,” Busch said. “Sometimes it’s hard to pull that information out of people.” But the team persisted and completed its task.

Busch was the third J school student to be accepted for the internship at STRATCOM. Past UNL interns in the program were Maggie Tunning and Adrian Whitsett.

The experience of working in a government environment and gaining a new experience was what made the internship so important to Busch. She said the most satisfying part was piecing bits of information together as they were discovered. Figuring out the cause of satellite failure also proved to be intriguing.

Despite the challenges her team faced, Busch recommends other J school students apply for the STRATCOM internship.

“Go with something outside of your comfort zone,” she said. “You won’t regret it in the end.”

Elise Hernandez

When Elise Hernandez introduced herself onstage at dinner reception in New York City for promising minority advertising students, she uttered a catch phrase that any student from Nebraska would say.

Go Big Red!

To her surprise, although only two others from University of Nebraska–Lincoln had accompanied her, she heard some hoops and hollers from tables around the room.

That Husker connection might have helped Hernandez, a senior advertising major, network with big names earlier during a recruiter session with 38 advertising agencies.

Hernandez was among only 50 students named to American Advertising Federation’s (AAF) Most Promising Minority Student list. She visited the New York Athletic Club Feb. 2–4 to talk to potential employers and learn more about the advertising industry.

A chance to meet and connect

“The whole opportunity was great because you get to do these interviews all day long and meet with people who you’d never in a million years get to talk to,” Hernandez said.

Joan Wortmann

Senior advertising major Joan Wortmann was named to AAF’s Honor Roll and also was invited to attend the convention in New York and participate in the different events.

On the second day of the conference, the students had three hours to meet with the 38 recruiters representing in-house agencies from companies such as JCPenney, General Mills and the ABC Television Network and global advertising groups such as Digitas, Leo Burnett and Momentum.

First impressions matter

“It was important that you try to meet with as many people as you could because if you made a good first impression, they’d invite you back for an interview in the afternoon,” Hernandez said.

Hernandez didn’t get to talk to every agency in the morning but had three interviews in the afternoon with McCann Erikson advertising agency, Turner Broadcasting System (TBS) and Interpublic Group, an advertising and marketing agency.

Wortmann talked to Leo-Burnett and JCPenney and, after the convention, went to Dallas for a second interview with JCPenney.

Her passion for advertising started as a freshman when she was in the National Student Advertising Competition. She decided to graduate a year early and is excited to start her career.

“[NSAC] gave me a view of what advertising is. It was a real-life experience,” Wortmann said. “I love advertising. I can’t wait to do it full time.”

More students should apply for the award

Both students said other UNL students should apply for the award because of the invaluable experience at the New York conference. Advertising professor Amy Struthers said she wished more students would have applied — she sent an e-mail to all students, inviting them to apply. Wortmann and Hernandez were the only students from UNL who turned in applications.

“We have outstanding students here, and in the future my goal is for each faculty member to nominate a student of color for this award so we get as much visibility and as much opportunity for our students as possible,” Struthers said.

Hernandez, Wortmann were active and involved

Wortmann has been active as an officer in Advertising Club with Struthers, and this spring both students were in Struthers’ capstone advertising campaigns course.

“They’ve both been very strong in our program but in very different ways,” Struthers said. “Joan’s been involved in college activities, and Elise has been very focused on internships in the professional community.”

Hernandez didn’t find a job at the Most Promising Minority Student convention, but she’s still talking with agencies for an internship. And her experience in New York wasn’t just about work; she also got to go to a Broadway musical and to industry parties with her peers.

She said she networked with both potential employers and potential coworkers.

“I met a lot of very talented people, and you see the competition, which is a good boost of confidence because you realize that you’re doing the right things.”

(Front) Brandi Kruse, Alina Selyukh; (Back) Emily Ingram, Elicia Dover

Elicia Dover loves New York.

“I think everything happens here,” the recent UNL grad said. “You can walk down the street and always see someone doing something cool and new. There is a reason all of the major news stations are here. I think it’s the center of everything.”

Dover was one of four J school students who interned last fall at UNL’s ABC News on Campus bureau. That experience helped lead her to a spring semester interning in New York City for ABC’s “20/20.” That internship was extended, and then in May, she was offered a full-time job as a digital news associate with the news division.

UNL’s relationship with ABC, which began in August 2009, gives students the opportunity to prepare multimedia news stories for one of the nation’s largest news corporations.

“UNL and the students as the college here should realize they are very lucky to have ABC News on Campus because there are only six in the nation, and the opportunities that are available here through this bureau are unlike any others that are out there,” said Emily Ingram, a journalism and advertising senior from Franklin, Neb., who served as the inaugural bureau chief.

Kathy Christensen, the faculty member who supervises the bureau, emphasized the importance of the real-world experience.

“There’s a huge difference between doing stories for a class assignment and doing them for real distribution on a national platform, and our students have measurably improved their writing, reporting and video skills.  They’ve learned how to find stories of national interest and prepare those stories in the most effective ways.”

(Front) Wade Hilligoss, bureau chief Carson Stokebrand; (Back) Morgan Demmel

Dover, a senior journalism major from Bryant, Ark., was one of four students who began working for ABC on Campus in fall 2009. When she left for New York in January, two more students joined the three remaining interns to staff the bureau during spring semester. The bureau also is operating this summer with three interns.

Dover works on long-term projects at ABC

In New York, Dover did research and logged tapes, essential tasks for “20/20,” one of America’s premier depth reporting programs.  Instead of racing to tell breaking stories as fast as possible, “20/20” spends months, sometimes a year, on a one-hour program.

“It’s not just one day stories with quick turn-arounds. “20/20” is a long process; it’s not like a quick cable story,” Dover said. “It’s important to have in-depth stories to bring to light details people need to hear.”

Every Friday, Dover sat in the control room and watched as co-anchors Chris Cuomo and Elizabeth Vargas delivered stories that researchers had spent months compiling.

“’20/20’ has always been my dream,” Dover said. “I love the program, and I always watch it. I think that’s what did it for me; you always want to work for something you love.”

Dover received an e-mail last fall about the internship and immediately decided to apply. During winter break, Dover sat at home in Arkansas,  with her suitcases packed, not knowing until the last minute where she would be spending her spring semester. Finally, the call came, and Dover flew off to New York City and “20/20.”

Just as news organizations are more likely to hire interns they know, they are also likely to work with people with whom they had success in the past. That’s probably why ABC approached Christensen about opening a UNL bureau. Christensen is a former executive producer of “ABC’s World News Tonight with Peter Jennings” and of “ABC’s Weekend News.”

Christensen contributes to the students’ success

“One thing I think that can’t be overstated is Kathy Christensen is a fabulous mentor to have,” Ingram said. “I often get papers back from her, and they’re torn up — it’s not always rainbows and sunshine — but I feel I have grown tremendously just because of Kathy Christensen and this internship.”

Dover also praised Christensen and described working in the ABC bureau as an unequaled opportunity to engage in backpack journalism. The students are expected to go out into the field and do everything. Not only do they conduct interviews, but they must be able to properly set up the lighting, edit the video and then write a news article. The students’ work is posted on ABC’s campus website but often also appears in other ABC platforms.

In her semester with ABC News on Campus, Dover reported on topics varying from horses neglected because of the economic downturn to a record-setting balloonist turned philanthropist.

Christensen had good things to say about Dover’s work and that of her fellow interns.

“Elicia, like the other students in our first bureau, started off with a bang,” Christensen said. “Her first piece — about a hot air balloonist — was beautifully shot, and she did a terrific job of reporting. She really devoted herself to this experience, which paid off in getting the internship — and I know ABC has been very pleased with her work.”

Interns learn by doing

The On Campus bureau also regularly communicates with ABC executives in New York about the students’ work. Dover said this connection, along with the experience she gained with the bureau, help her get the internship with “20/20.”

“ABC News on Campus opened up the door for me because you work directly with producers in New York every day, and they get to know you on a personal level and what work you do,” Dover said.

Christensen, too, emphasized the importance of the on-campus work.

“This experience has been invaluable for our students,” she said. “Not only have they had an opportunity to do numerous text and video stories that have achieved national distribution and recognition, but they’ve become highly professional in terms of dealing with editors and producers in New York as well as with sources.”

In addition to helping the students connect to ABC, the experience in the ABC bureau has also helped students get internships with other prestigious news organizations. Ingram is working this summer as Web producer intern at The Washington Post. Brandi Kruse is interning this summer in New York at CBSNews.com in the video unit. And Alina Selyukh landed an internship at Thomson Reuters in Washington, D.C., for the summer, where she will be both writing and working with video.

Dover, who spent last summer in New York interning with Fox Business, knows that it takes much more than connections to land a major summer internship. Students must be motivated and willing to take a risk.

“It definitely takes the willingness to leave where you are comfortable, and it takes courage to be able to leave somewhere and give an internship in New York a shot,” she said. “Definitely, when interviewing, put your best foot forward, let them know how hard you will work and then follow through on that.”

Les Rose

It’s late on a Wednesday evening, and Les Rose is making the two-hour drive back to his home in Los Angeles. He shifts a little in his seat, stretching his shoulders, which are weary from 33 years of straining under a 28-pound camera.

It’s been another adventurous day for a Hawaiian shirt-clad Rose, who’s just finished shooting a news piece at a skate park in San Diego.

Being a CBS photojournalist often means 20-hour days and lots of driving, but Rose doesn’t mind. His job at CBS allows him to capture people’s stories on a digital disc and share them with the world. And for Rose, that’s worth the 20-hour days.

Because, in a word, Les Rose is a storyteller.

The May 2010 College of Journalism and Mass Communications master’s graduate seems eccentric enough to be a tall tale himself. He has a personality as large as his 6-foot-6 frame and a voice that crackles with electrical liveliness.

Every work day is different

There is no average day for Rose. His job at CBS has taken him to countless award shows, to Michael Jackson’s child molestation trial (and, some years after that, to 72 days covering Jackson’s death), to 12 days covering both O.J. Simpson trials, to spending a few days with Barack Obama during his presidential campaign. Rose has seen his fair share of danger, too, covering the wars in Central America in the mid 1980s, but he says the most dangerous assignment he’s ever been on was covering the LA riots of 1992.

But Rose will be the first to point out that occasionally dangerous situations are just another part of the adventure. And adventure, he said, is where the stories are.

“I’m always finding an excellent adventure,” he said. “This is a job where you don’t know where you’re going to go, who you’re going to meet and what you’re going to learn on any given day.”

Expanding the adventure into higher education

It was that sense of adventure and curiosity for learning that drove Rose to earn a master’s degree. The degree, he said, will bring his education “full circle.”

“I cold called a lot of colleges, but I called Nebraska out of loyalty,” he said. “I was born in Lincoln, after all, and my brother and father went to school here.”

His cold call landed him in the experienced hands of professor Nancy Mitchell, who directed him to UNL’s online master’s program. Mitchell also headed his three-person thesis committee.

Rose’s thesis, a culmination of almost two years of work, is a piece on Edward R. Murrow, the “patron saint of CBS News” and a storyteller himself. But those two years of thesis writing and studying were hard-fought because once Rose decided on Nebraska, he had to find a way to bridge the gap between time for work and time for study. And to accommodate the time and distance gap between LA and Lincoln, Rose followed UNL’s online master’s program.

“Since a quarter of the class grade is participation, I had to be online and present at every single class. It was an interesting challenge because California time is two hours behind Nebraska time,” he said. “To make everything work, I’d find time between shooting footage to study in airports and hotel rooms at all hours of the day and night.”

He laughed a little. “I didn’t used to drink coffee, but I sure do now.”

Despite the hectic schedule, Rose still had time to make a positive impression on Mitchell.

“He’s one of those students you just never forget,” she said, glancing at a strange molten piece of metal that Rose sent her in the mail. It’s got a letter attached to that has a CBS header and Rose’s familiar scrawl explaining that it used to be part of a fancy car but was melted in a California fire.

“He found this one on one of his adventures.”

Professor Barney McCoy, another one of Rose’s thesis advisers and a former broadcast journalist himself, shares Mitchell’s enthusiastic view of Rose as a student.

“It’s been wonderful to have him as a graduate student because he’s always trying to add more to the equation,” he said. “Les has an infectious personality that’s driven by his curiosity. All those things make him a natural at what he does.”

Naturally, McCoy agrees, that’s storytelling.

And working in LA, that often means telling celebrity stories. But after nearly 40 award shows, Rose isn’t really interested in celebrities. He doesn’t get star struck anymore.

“Celebrities kind of bore me,” he said. “They’re always selling something, like a movie.” After a moment, he relented. “But I really did like Tom Hanks. He was nice.”

Everybody has a story

So after tiring of covering the celebrity scene, Rose and his CBS colleague Steve Hartman set out on a new adventure:  to tell the stories of ordinary Americans.

Their adventure began some 12 years ago when Hartman had the idea of throwing a dart at a map of America and following wherever it landed. The series, originally called “Everybody Has a Story,” lasted six years.

Once they reached their destination, they would grab a phone book, flip to a page and start calling. One time, it took up to 44 calls before someone agreed to tell their story.

Currently, whenever New York-based Hartman is west of the Rockies, he and Rose work together on “Assignment America” which airs Monday nights on the CBS Evening News. Those pieces also are heartfelt and often humorous feature stories, but this time the people are not picked at random.

Hartman recently renamed “Everybody Has a Story” to “Everybody in the World Has a Story” for a three-part series on the CBS Evening News

“These are people without publicists,” Rose said. “They have these great stories to tell, but no one ever asks. When we say everybody has a story, we mean it.”

There’s Ken in Arthur, Neb., who proposed to his wife the day she learned she had terminal cancer. She died a year later.

And there’s Suzie in Pennsylvania, the woman who had a hysterectomy at the age of 25 and has since adopted six boys.

“How can you compare a story like that to a celebrity?” Rose said. “I would trade any celebrity story any day for an ‘Assignment America’ story.”

Born to tell stories

And telling those stories is what Rose believes he was made to do.

“I love story telling,” he said. “Stories are about people, and my goal is to make people feel comfortable, and so then they do what they do, and I just disappear and capture it all.”

His dedication to telling stories goes even beyond his job. If Rose ever parts from CBS, he says it’s been his dream to teach others all that he’s learned from the field.

“I would absolutely love to teach, but my day job is a little too awesome to give up,” he said.  “I think I’ll just be satisfied with a master’s for a while now.”

Mitch Smith

Mitch Smith, a 19-year-old from Overland Park, Kan., has been selected to go on a reporting trip to Africa this summer with New York Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristof. Smith is a freshman studying journalism at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. An American journalist, Kristof has lived on four continents, reported on six and traveled to more than 140 countries.

As the winner of “Win A Trip,” Smith will have a chance to blog for the Times Web site and to file videos to the Times and YouTube.

An op-ed columnist for Times since 2001, Kristof’s columns have often focused on global health, poverty and gender issues in the developing worlds. In particular, since 2004 he has written dozens of columns about Darfur and visited the area 10 times. He is the winner of two Pulitzer Prizes.

Kristof said the aim of “Win A Trip” is to help focus attention on the problems of global poverty and on the remedies as well.

Smith, who has never been out of the United States, wrote in his winning essay, “I will fully invest myself in this project … this is the epitome of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make a difference and witness the world’s problems firsthand.”

Charlyne Berens, interim dean of the College of Journalism and Mass Communications, said, “This is a fabulous opportunity for Mitch. We are thrilled for him and so proud of him. We look forward to reading the journalism this will allow him to produce.”

To be considered for “Win A Trip,” which began in 2006, students at least 18 years old from American universities were invited to submit a written essay or a video entry stating their reasons for wanting to go to Africa and explaining what makes them suited for such an experience. This year the Center for Global Development assisted Kristof with the review of 893 applicants.

Past “Win A Trip” winners have traveled to Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, Rwanda, Burundi, the eastern Congo, Senegal, Sierre Leone and Liberia.

Read Nicholas Kristof’s announcement of his 2010 “Win A Trip” contest winner and Mitch Smith’s winning essay.

It’s not easy to be a journalist in Mexico.

Phyllis Larsen (left), Karen Pedersen and Allie Busch visited a school for disabled children in Cozumel to give them craft donations.

That was clear quickly to the 10 students who spent two weeks on the island of Cozumel in late May, studying the media in a developing country.

The students, led by Phyllis Larsen, senior lecturer of advertising, met with Mexican journalists, business owners and residents during the study abroad trip.

The students saw a number of ways Mexican media are different from U.S. media.

Mexican reporters and photographers have to buy their own equipment. Gustavo Villegas, a journalist for Novedades de Quintana Roo newspaper, said journalists pay for cameras, lenses, voice recorders and other tools out of their own pockets.  That can add up quickly for a journalist whose job doesn’t usually even include benefits.

Another difference the students found was that many journalists train on the job rather than studying for their careers first.

Victor Robledo, a journalist for Por Esto newspaper, said most reporters have little professional training. Some choose to take a ferry to the mainland for classes at a college in Cancun since no courses are available on the island, he said, but it is not required.

Credibility is also a problem Mexican journalists face.  Just as credibility for U.S. papers has suffered in recent years, few Mexicans trust what is published in their country’s newspapers. Robledo said no journalistic standards exist in Mexico for things such as story sourcing.

Many residents believe Novedades de Quintana Roo, a statewide newspaper, is the most serious and reliable of all the papers available in Cozumel. Journalists for Novedades can get fired for printing untruthful information, but that is rare at other Mexican newspapers.

Yet no more than 2 percent of Cozumel residents pay the eight pesos it costs to read a reliable newspaper, Villegas said.

Por Esto is the most popular newspaper on the island with the highest circulation because of its broad coverage of news.  Reporters for Por Esto do not have to cite any sources in their stories, though Robledo said he makes it a point to interview at least two people for every story he writes.

Nora Hernandez, the director of social communications for the government in Cozumel, acknowledged that not all papers in Cozumel are accurate.

Many Cozumel residents said De Peso is similar to tabloids found in the United States  and is full of unreliable information. De Peso’s pages are filled with photos of blood-stained accident victims and barely covered women.

And just like in the United States, newspapers aren’t the main source of news for most people.

Island residents Josefina Gonzalez and her son, Geronimo Hernandez, said they get their news from TV because it is the most reliable source. Cozumel has its own station, Channel 5, which broadcasts news three times a day.

Radio is another source of news on the island. Radio licenses are issued by the government based on population size.

Cozumel has a population of 90,000 people, which qualifies it for only one license, the one issued to Sol Sterio, which is both a radio and a TV station. When its two news programs air on the radio, the DJs can be seen on TV, too.

Cozumel residents listen for public news announcements about hurricanes, health alerts like the H1N1 virus or even schedules of cruise ships coming to the island.

Larsen has been taking students to Cozumel to study media since the summer of 2007. She had made many scuba diving trips to the island over the years  and was sure it would make a safe learning environment.

Through Larsen’s extensive network of contacts, the students added a twist to their study abroad experience by completing service learning projects during the trip. “I never expected to do volunteer work on the island, but I’m really glad we got the chance to,” said Allie Busch, a junior advertising major.

Seven of the 10 students worked with local biologists on the island’s turtle salvation program, searching the beaches for sea turtles laying their eggs. They saw one turtle and found three nests. The eggs were counted and moved to safer locations farther from the ocean.

The students worked with Karen Pedersen, a coordinator for volunteering on the island and adviser to Núcleo de Apoyo Familiar (NUAFA). NUAFA is an organization that provides childcare, support programs and job training for families in crisis in Cozumel.

Each UNL student brought an extra suitcase of clothing donations that were sold at a “Gran Bazar” garage sale to raise money for the group. Craft donations were taken to a school for disabled children the UNL students visited. They played a basketball game against a local girls team and had a picnic with students from the island’s University of Quintana Roo.
“Even though we went to study journalism and advertising, our trip was a lot about building relationships because that is so important in this culture,” Larsen said.

The group salsa danced with students from the Spanish English Academy one evening and practiced their cross-cultural communication skills.  Gonzalez, a cooking instructor in Cozumel, even made the students two authentic Mexican dinners during their stay.

Jessica Sorensen, sophomore journalism major, summed it up: “They let us into their homes and let us help them, but really they gave much more to us in return.”