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A journalism student found her passion for storytelling reignited while covering Charlotte this summer at The Ledger
Cooper Hall
I spend a lot of time writing. Between my journalism major and creative nonfiction minor, working for my school’s newspaper and the simple joy of writing in my free time, I can’t even begin to count the hours I’ve spent stringing words into sentences and sentences into paragraphs, deleting and editing until I find the meaning in it all.
This summer at The Charlotte Ledger, I buckled in for more.
In mid-June, I was coming off a three-week study abroad where I’d written every day: two years of writing for The Daily Tar Heel, an incredible journey reporting on the Winter Olympics in Milan and many peer-reviewed articles and essays.
I was excited for the summer and ready to get to work with The Ledger. But, like any college student, I was also fighting off the flames of burnout. It seemed I had, at least in part, lost sight of what makes journalism so special.
The first interview I conducted at The Ledger was with McLain Waddell, a man who had ridden The Fury roller coaster at Carowinds 14,000 times. I’ll admit, before I spoke with Waddell, I assumed the article would be about thrill-seeking adrenaline junkies.
But as I started to look into Waddell, it seemed his story was something else entirely. The interview ended up being an honest, human declaration of mental health struggles and a journey to find peace.
When I got off the phone, I remembered why I had checked the box next to media and journalism on my application to UNC Chapel Hill — each and every person on this planet has a story to tell, and it’s almost never what you expect it to be.
As I began writing Waddell’s story, I felt the same rush I did when I saw my first print byline in my hometown’s local newspaper.
My fingers flew over my keyboard, and I was reminded that my job isn’t about the hours I spend filling a Google Doc with words. It has always been — and will always be – about the stories I am telling, the people that ground my articles and the perspectives I get the privilege of hearing, transcribing and platforming for an audience.
This internship taught me that no matter where I am writing, what I am writing about or how long I spend writing, it is the people — with their singular, fascinating perspectives — that will drive the meaning.
Past serving as a reminder of why I care so deeply about this profession, this internship pushed me to do reporting in areas I had no experience in and write stories I was largely unfamiliar with. This summer, I grew immensely as a journalist.
Working with Ashley Fahey, Lindsey Banks and Tony Mecia, I was able to dip my toe into data reporting, city council meetings and stories that dealt with transportation, government, funding and science. These are areas of journalism that I used to think I had no interest in. This internship, and the ever-present helping hand of Fahey, Banks and Mecia, showed me that I was wrong.
All summer, I found perspectives and stories I hadn’t expected — a community hub in an otherwise lacking area of Charlotte, a forest haven to process grief at your own pace, senior centers that make many elders feel valued — and every day I learned something new.
I am walking away from The Ledger with a head full of refined skills and a heart full of refreshed passion. And for that, to The Ledger team and all of our readers, I am eternally grateful.