By: Sheila Crowley
Murray County News Staffwriter
Job shadowing is termed as a work experience option where students learn about a job by walking through the workday as a shadow alongside of a person. The experience can give a glimpse of what the student may experience should they choose this type of work for their career path.
Anna Kolenko, a junior at Murray County Central, spent a day with me learning a little bit about the newspaper. Her interest in journalism seemed like a nice fit for the newspaper world.
Students of the careers class are to complete a job shadow in a field they are interested in. This is usually done one day out of their semester. Following the experience, the students are required to write a two-page paper regarding their job shadowing experience.
Kolenka spent a day learning how the paper is created on the computer and what’s involved in the week-to-week deadlines. We spent time discussing what it takes to fill the pages of the paper and the cost involved in the creation of the publication. Much like a puzzle, the newspaper pages start out blank and then are given life as each story, photo, and advertisement are fit perfectly together to give it a pleasing effect to catch the reader’s eye.
Additionally, Kolenka was my side-kick on a few sales calls for the day and learned about several businesses in the Slayton community. As we visited the various businesses each entity shared what they offered the community and their customers which gave Kolenka a better understanding of how they worked.
And what is a newspaper without stories? A journalist is described as someone who collects, prepares, and distributes news and related commentary and feature materials through media such as newspapers.
New to the United States and the Slayton area Kolenka listened intently and even asked a few questions. During the discussion were the five W’s of writing which include: Who, What, When, Where, and Why. If a journalist can include these simple questions, most often they will help complete the story by leading the writer deeper into the person or what happened.
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