How far I've come...
I was eager to get my foot in the door right away. I loved N.C. State but knew that they did not have a huge focus on media and journalism. I was going to have to do more than simply attend my daily classes. My first semester of college I took the initiative and contacted the N.C. State Athletics Department and was lucky enough to land a Communications and Marketing internship with the Men’s Basketball Team. This would launch a number of opportunities inside the N.C. State Athletics Department where I continued to hold different internships with multiple sports throughout my entire college career.
My sophomore year I jumped in front of a camera for the first time when I was hired by Wolfpack Sports TV, a digital media channel and student run, on-campus television station. I expanded my skill set by experimenting with everything from editing, producing, script writing, hosting shows, one-on-one interviews, to even doing play-by-play and color for lacrosse, soccer and volleyball.
The summer after my sophomore year, I was offered a Field Reporter position for a collegiate summer wooden bat team in the CVCL called the Mooresville Spinners. I produced a show called “Spinner in the Spotlight” and recapped games for their social media sites. I took on another job that summer in Kannapolis, NC for the Chicago White Sox Low-A affiliate, the Kannapolis Intimidators. At 19-years-old I was taking on a new role as an In-Game Host, entertaining crowds and interacting with thousands of fans.
My junior year I spent less time writing the media notes for the athletic department and more time studying them when I started working on the digital side with GoPack.com. I became the host of a weekly segment called the “Monday Minute” highlighting all N.C. State sports and would later become the digital media reporter for the Men’s Basketball Team conducting pregame and postgame interviews with players and coaches. During this same semester, in the Spring of 2016, I received an internship with Spectrum News(formerly known as Time Warner Cable News). It was this internship that would change the next year of my life.
Following the summer as a video/reporter intern for the Coastal Plain League I was approached by Spectrum News at the start of my senior year. They had created an internship in honor of their Sports Director who had passed away in 2015. The team had realized how much I successfully applied myself and contributed in my previous internship with the station, that they hired me as the first ever Jim Connors Memorial Intern. This was no ordinary internship, I was given the same responsibilities as a regular local sports reporter. They gave me equipment, a car and sent me out in the field by myself to turn sports stories and packages for their nightly sports show. After my first official “one-man band” assignment, I went home, turned on the 10 p.m. “Sports Night” and there I was reporting on my own TV! At twenty-one years old and still in college, I was consistently covering all of the major collegiate and professional sports in the North Carolina Triangle on a channel that aired across the entire state.
In May of 2017, I graduated from N.C. State University with a Bachelor of Arts in Communication Media Studies with minors in both Business Administration and Journalism.
