On April 4 this year, Akil Baddoo of the Detroit Tigers became the 128th player in Major League Baseball history to hit a home run in his first career plate appearance.
This is my first blog post. While it would be nice to knock it out of the park on my first attempt, I’ll settle for simply making contact and hustling down the line as hard as I can.
My journey toward a broadcasting career isn’t on a speedy trajectory. I graduated high school in 1994 and that fall started working for a fundraising company, helping elementary schools make money selling cheesecake, cookie dough, wrapping paper and the like. I took night classes at Rio Hondo College and worked on the school newspaper, El Paisano.
In 1996, the manager of the fundraising company announced that she was moving to Tennessee. The owner asked if I was interested in managing the business. My response was, “I’m only 20 years old.” He grinned as he looked at me and said, “So, is that a yes or a no?”
For the next 20 years, I ran a small business while taking classes intermittently at nearby Cerritos College. Having a stable job as a young adult gave me the opportunity to move out and afford rent/mortgage payments. The seasonal nature of school fundraising allowed me to get away during summers and broadcast baseball, then have a job to return to in the fall. For these reasons, I do not regret the path that I have taken.
Today, that journey toward the dream job is rounding third and heading home. I’ve gone back to college, pursuing a Mass Communication and Media Studies degree, with a minor in Digital Audiences. The last time I applied for a broadcasting job, it came down to me and a recent college grad. The latter was chosen due to social media strength — something I admittedly did not have.
I selected Arizona State University for my degree because of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism. Although I will miss out on the physical aspect of being on campus (i.e., calling Sun Devils baseball action or anchoring a segment on Cronkite News), I hope to absorb as much as I can about social media and the latest technological advances in journalism and marketing.
Thank you to Dan Gillmor for the nudge to create my own URL and start blogging about what’s going on in my life… and in my mind. I look forward to learning all about navigating 21st century media in MCO 425, and networking with some of my classmates.
