News
Award-Winning Journalists Offer Advice To WOUB Newsroom
By: Megan Moseley
Posted on:
Two award-winning journalists bestowed their career wisdom on students during a visit to the WOUB newsroom Monday afternoon.
Replete with experience and expertise, CNN's Candy Crowley and Leon Harris, anchor at WJLA in Washington, D.C., talked all things journalism before kicking off Communications Week 2013 at the Templeton-Blackburn Memorial Auditorium later that evening.
Crowley, the award-winning host of "State of the Union with Candy Crowley" on CNN, serves as chief political correspondent for the organization and covers presidential, congressional and gubernatorial races and Capitol Hill.
She moderated a 2012 general election debate between President Obama and Gov. Mitt Romney, making her the first woman to moderate a presidential debate in two decades.
Harris spent 20 years at CNN's headquarters in Atlanta where he co-anchored CNN Live Today and Prime News and hosted CNN Presents and American Stories. He is also a 1983 radio and television alumnus of Ohio University.
Crowley and Harris gave student journalists tips on how to make it in the ever-evolving media world.
Crowley said, first and foremost, to always do their very best.
"That's your security. It has to be that you did the very best you could that day," she said.
She also said a good journalist is a good listener and "has an eye for something off".
Crowley recounted a story of traveling in Egypt with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The trip was rather normal, she said, until one day she seemed to constantly be on her phone. The abrupt change in behavior sparked Crowley's curiosity and after investigation it came to light she was talking with President Bill Clinton about his plans to bomb Bosnia.
Crowley also advised students to have a thick skin, build sources through "time and trust" and remember that "everything's politics".
Harris spoke enthusiastically to a room full of students about how he got his start as a cameraman at CNN and worked his way up to anchor.
He recommended aspiring journalists do what he did, and that's to do whatever they can to get their foot in the door.
In the meantime, he advised the students to hone their writing craft and be eager learners open to new experiences.
Harris also works with child advocate organizations For Love of Children, Junior Achievement and MenzFit.