photo by Veronica Kiss
In-depth Biography:
After I left college the first time to work in "the real world,"
I briefly joined with a former high school classmate to create a unique magazine for multi-cultural people, their families, and friends: Shades Magazine: A New World
. We lacked the chops to sell the concept, so it folded.
From 2000 to 2006,
I have created, produced, and was host of several one-hour conversations on Twin Cities' KFAI Fresh Air Radio. I called them At Issue. I wanted to satisfy my curiosity for public affairs, ask questions, tell stories, and control the content. So, I created the program. The topics included clarifying bisexuality, homeless teenagers, and the complexities of domestic abuse. I began to learn about interviewing and learned why I prefer to be the host of conversations over doing interviews.
It is ironic that I did not think of them as being journalism. I had only a vague and informal understanding that this was journalism.
I spoke with professionals, clinicians, and layexperts. The facility's production manager praised At Issue's professionalism. After the local ABC affiliate, KSTP, chose to name their political program At Issue, which I had not copywritten, I renamed this On Topic.
Summer of 2007,
I produced and was host of my best hour of On Topic to date; it examined the legacy and life lessons of multitalented African-American artist Gordon Parks. In-studio, I asked his relatives about the man and their uncle, aside from the icon whom some people know.
This was the first conversation where I deliberately prepared as a journalist. I did preinterviews. I sought a research-loving friend to provide me with at least three times as much background as I needed for that hour. I divided the hour into four themed segments. I wrote intros, outros and rejoins. I brought in bumper music. I asked a fellow non-traditional classmate help me.
Then I earned a colossal opportunity, in part, by networking.
Fall of 2007,
I was a full-time intern at National Public Radio's Tell Me More program. While I was there, I also reported a story for the fall 2007 Intern Edition. Inspired or provoked by a Baltimore Times headline, Bush urges GOP to woo Blacks; because of that, I reported the feature story, Black Republicans fight for their Political Voice, for the show.
The experience was amazing. Especially for a man of color to work at NPR. To work on a show of color that was run by people of color was important. I made friends and found mentors who were very cool, giving, and patient. I met people who can continue to help and teach me even across the distance between Minneapolis and the Washington, D.C.
I learned how they do preinterviews at the network. I learned how to book guests, how to prepare, and maybe fail-proof, story pitches.
During winter 2007 and spring 2008,
I filed several feature public affairs stories with Twin Cities' KFAI Fresh Air Radio. This was part of a semester of directed study for my bachelor's degree in communication studies.
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One story told about a man who tried to save a woman's life when the Interstate 35W bridge collapsed, but the price and the flames were too high. This aired on February 1, 2008.
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Another one reported on the official dedication of St. Paul Public School's Gordon Parks High School, personalizing the story through the hardships of a graduating senior. Her experience typified chances given to at-risk students.
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I reported on Dr. Bambi Haggins, formerly of the University of Michigan. On February 7, 2008, she examined the comic discourse of racial representation, by dissecting a comedy sketch by comedian Dave Chapelle.
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I had a conversation with actress Sheryl Lee Ralph about her one-woman show, Sometimes I Cry. Her performance coincided with National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day.
All the while, my concern about the meager numbers of public radio journalists of color grew more and more. I discussed this festering concern with the journalism school’s new professor of Journalism, Diversity & Equality
During this time, I also redesigned WrightsWords.com.
Summer and fall 2008,
During summer 2008, I was a research assistant for the Cowles Professor of Journalism, Diversity & Equality, Catherine R. Squires, at the University of Minnesota. I researched and designed a project that would introduce public radio storytelling to at-risk high school students.
During the fall 2008, I managed the editorial and technical aspects of teaching teens to produce stories for public radio. I was a lead instructor within a group of three who taught practical lessons in small groups.
During a pause in this, I attended the Third Coast International Audio Festival as a minority scholar. I was grateful to have my registration fee paide for and much of my travel expenses subsidized. By attending, I took part in a panel of emerging college radio producers, where I answered questions about the Gordon Parks High School story.
During summer 2009,
I was a full-time, paid intern at Chicago Public Radio's flagship Eight Forty-Eight show. I produced many feature segments, some from my own story pitches. In the process of producing taped segments, I learned how to do basic engineering, studio production, and book ISDNs.
I pitched and produced segments that asked vital cultural and historical questions:
- What is it to be Latino, or Latina, or Hispanic?
- What happens when Illinois' 2009 "doomsday budget" forces a foster mother to consider the impossible – breaking her family apart?
- How was an African-American, who was crucial to making the legacies of Medgar Evers, Fannie Lou Hamer and others, omitted from history books?
- How has Chicago changed since its Red Summer of 1919?
I was a key producer for an off-site round table segment that wrapped-up the newsroom's 50/50 series: the odds of graduating. I learned to use Sony Vegas to edit digital audio. I edited several segments for air.
