This summer was anything but ordinary.
Every morning at 5 a.m., I hit the roads to train for the upcoming cross country season. A few hours later, I found myself in a meeting in the “crystal palace,” preparing for a day of reporting for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
The next day, I prepared to do it all over again – every weekday, for 10 weeks.
Landing an internship as a reporter on the health and science desks of the PG – alongside 12 other students from across the nation – was one of the most challenging yet rewarding experiences of my life.
At the PG, I authored 22 stories on topics ranging from salmonella outbreaks to the tumor microenvironment to exercise. One story assignment took me on a road trip to DuBois, where I interviewed an orthopedic surgeon about an emerging ACL reconstruction technique known as the fertilized ACL.
It wasn’t just the health and science stories that made this summer unforgettable. Pittsburgh became a backdrop for political drama: an attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump in nearby Butler and the announcement of President Joe Biden dropping out of the 2024 race for White House.
I didn’t directly cover these events, but I was surrounded by a team working around-the-clock to do so. When news broke on July 13 of the attempted assassination of Trump, reporters and interns immediately set aside their stories and were dispatched to Butler’s farmlands to gather whatever information they could.
The Sunday paper was completely revamped, with executives staying in the office late into the night to accomplish this task.
After Biden endorsed Kamala Harris for the Democratic presidential nomination, PG reporters worked quickly to learn more about Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a finalist for the Democratic VP spot.
It’s one thing to read about journalism in textbooks and learn that adaptability is essential to working in a newsroom; it’s another to find yourself face-to-face with stories that were once just topics on Canvas discussion boards.
If you’d told me at the start of my education at SFU that I’d intern as a reporter, I would have laughed. Talking to strangers? Engaging in long conversations with leading researchers, clinicians and community leaders?
It felt impossible back then, but this summer taught me many lessons – especially the benefits of stepping out of my comfort zone.
Many of my days at the PG during those 10 weeks were long and tiring, but they taught me that reporting is much more than asking questions and adhering to Associated Press style. It’s about actively listening, embracing curiosity, telling stories that matter, and daring to write interestingly and differently.
At the PG, the people made the place. I wouldn’t have made it through the long days of writing without my fellow interns, mentors and editors, countless iced lattes, walks around the block, cat photos and inside jokes.
I am an aspiring science writer and exercise physiologist, and the Post-Gazette provided me the opportunity to translate complex scientific research into engaging stories for general audiences. The PG gave me the chance to share the beauty and wonder of science in ways that are informative and fun.
