Cherubs discover their passions
Ivana Dukanovic, a cherub from Los Altos, Calif., came to the cherub program with the dream of becoming a broadcast journalist. After attending sessions with guest speakers Cynthia Wang, Los Angeles Associate Bureau Chief for People magazine, and Bret Begun, National Affairs editor for Newsweek, Dukanovic found her passion had grown to include more than just television reporting. |
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| “Through the program I learned that there’s so many things I could do that now I’m in this gray area,” she said. “I want to be a broadcast journalist. I circled it on the survey [of what type of media we want to do], but my pen was drifting toward magazine.” Dukanovic was not alone. Other cherubs arrived at the program with preconceived notions of what they wanted to do in journalism. Through a variety of sessions touching on the many types of journalism, cherubs explored what they knew they loved and found new areas of journalism that piqued their interest. Sessions included: magazine writing, magazine reporting, profile writing, magazine publishing, and free-lance writing. Jim Santel, a cherub from St. Louis, approached the cherub program with a passion for both newspaper and magazine writing. Through sessions and electives like profile writing, however, he realized his interest was in magazine journalism. “What I like about magazine journalism is you can spread out a little more and you can take more time,” he said. “For instance, with the all-day story, when we had 15-minute deadlines, I was like ‘I don’t want to do that.’ ” Unlike Santel, who was sure journalism would be his career path, Lisa Silverman, a cherub from Ellicott City, Md., wanted to attend the cherub program because she had a passion not only for journalism, but also for law. She said this program would help her decide between the two for a career. After attending optional sessions with Medill Professor David Protess about wrongly convicted prisoners, she realized that she did not have to choose one over the other. “My heart stopped for a second because I was so excited to know how connected and cohesive journalism and law can be and that I could do both in my career,” she said. “I don’t have to choose just one.” Marissa Mumford, a cherub from Westfield, N.J., came to the program with journalism as an interest but not in mind as a profession. She saw the program as a way to become an expert in the subject. “Through this program I think my desire to learn about journalism has been filled, but it hasn’t made me want to be a journalist more,” she said. “Every session interested me but I felt like I was looking through a lens, but the lens like ‘oh, this is really interesting,’ not the lens of ‘this is me.’ ” Cherub instructor Mary Lou Song may have given the cherubs the correct words to live by in her session on her role in the birth of eBay. “Where so ever you go, go with all of your heart,” she said. |
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