Living on the EDGE

Digital Media and Communication senior Jamie Bigaj recently completed a summer internship at 103.3 WEDG "The Edge". Bigaj says that the internship was "great", and what's even better is that it landed him some part-time employment. He now works in the promotions department of the station and has even had a few opportunities to be on air.

Ultimately Bigaj would like to be on-air full time. He is schedued to graduate in Spring 2012 and believes that the internship has opened-up options that just weren't there before. If you are at all interested in an internship, please contact Prof. Chris Gallant at cgallant@hilbert.edu ~CG

Update: Jamie Bigaj successfully found employment at 103.3 WEDG "The Edge in promotions and as a part time DJ. 

Convergence: It's not going Away

If you are considering a job in print journalism, marketing, advertising and public relations... then you need to consider the power and influence that understanding the use of video, photography and audio will have over your industries in the upcoming years. Why are these changes coming about? The word that will explain it all is the Internet. Media convergence is here and more powerful than ever.

Companies like Gannett (one of their company's officers is featured in this video) is a major player in this effort. They are also one of the biggest employers in the print and media arena. The own numerous TV studios and about 80 newspapers around the country and oversees. They even own specialty web portals that provide content and the Army and Navy Times. Please watch the video and be aware of the influence of multimedia in the next decade's job market.

I worked for Gannett from 2006-09 and saw Gannett's push to get everyone on board, including reporters, and it was less than stellar. I picked-up the story from Wasim Ahmad, an Assistant Professor of Journalism at SUNY/Stony Brook who also worked for Gannett. He does a good job of describing on his blog the foibles of Gannett in trying to implement media convergence at their newspapers. I think he put it best when he stated,

"You want more video? Hire more visual journalists. You want more words? Hire more writers. Rare is the person who can do both".

So true. One thing that is also true is that convergence isn't going away - it's here to stay. What is also true is that this is an exciting time for journalism as it's changing. Many say that journalism is changing for the worse, but who really knows? There is still quite a lot of good journalism out there, and some of it's showing-up in new places such as on the web.

News organizations such as ProPublica the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Huffington Post, Politico, Salon.com, Slate and NPR to name a few are making great strides in keeping journalism alive. Journalism isn't dead, it's just changing and change is inevitable and thus must be embraced. Also, while change must be embraced, it doesn't mean that we should continue to embrace ideas that are proven to not be sustainable, or hinder journalistic practices. We are still in that testing phase, but after a while, when something isn't working the industry will have to change and try something else. Something else such as hiring more folks to do all the jobs created by the convergence movement.
~CG

Allen Leight, '06

Allen Leight is a reporter for WKBW-TV and does writing, editing, shooting and reporting of news stories that vary from hard news to feature, on a daily basis. I had a chance to catch-up with Al just before the semester began, and as usual he was hard at work!

Allen was part of the inaugural DMaC cohort. In Al's own words,"Hilbert afforded me opportunities to assume leadership roles, while the smaller class size provided for a more intimate and personal education experience. The dedication to each student and resources available provided me withe the experience and knowledge to land interviews, and ultimately, be successful in my desired field of work". You can see Leight's work most days of the week on WKBW-TV, Channel 7 News.

Notable DMaC Alumna

Recently I had the chance to visit with notable DMaC alumna, Cheri (White) Leight. She graduated from Hilbert College with a BA degree in Digital Media and Communication with a minor in Leadership in 2006. She was later hired at Ingram Micro in July of 2006. Leight was originally hired as a Marketing Administrator and has since been promoted in the company to a Marketing Manager, responsible for the Ingram Micro Solution Centers in Buffalo, NY and Santa Ana, CA.

In the photograph above, Leight poses in a brand new green-screen studio which she oversees. She acknowledges her college experience in media production was a key reason why she was hired. Videos are produced in these studios to educate clients of the services available to them through Ingram Micro's solution center.

The Solution Centers are state-of-the-art training and demonstration facilities designed to address the needs of IT solution providers. Cheri develops and implements comprehensive vendor marketing plans for a significant number of partnering manufacturers. Her responsibilities include monitoring and driving revenue goals, expenses and profit margins for the Solution Centers.
~CG