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“To be in this business, you have to just love the news to the point where you don’t mind working weekends, holidays, nights, overtime; and you don’t mind dropping everything when a story happens,” says Bridget Johnson, an L.A. Daily News political columnist whose column is syndicated on the New York Times news service and also contributes to USA Today and Wall Street Journal.
“You have to be the person who will do the editorial equivalent of walking to school three miles in the snow barefoot. You have to put the news and the newsroom first,” explained Johnson. “But to be in that world and have an impact – especially with everything that’s going on today – it’s pretty priceless.”
Johnson originally worked toward a criminology degree at Fresno State University before quitting her studies to focus on full-time work at a weekly newspaper. According to Johnson, degrees are useful to a point for jobs in journalism, but certain things are best learned in the field, like writing fast and well, relating to people and gaining trust, and gathering information.
“So much of that can’t be taught. At least in my experience, the experience you have on your resume counts more than the education,” Johnson said, adding that college students would do well to work for community or student media while earning their degree. “Employers want to know that you’ve been in the newsroom, doing it hands-on, and you have an editor they can talk to.”
Johnson eventually learned that her decision to quit school was not an unusual one in the world of newspaper journalism. “It’s really funny how many successful journalists I know dropped out of college,” Johnson said. However, she added, a degree can be particularly helpful if related to a beat you would like to cover. For instance, an aspiring business reporter might major in business and minor in journalism or communications.
“You’ll really earn respect with that,” Johnson expressed, speaking from first-hand experience. Johnson’s criminology studies helped her gain trust in the world of crime and courts, the first beat she covered. “The cops knew I knew what they were talking about, so that opened up a whole new relationship, to the point where I had these guys calling me at home with tips.”
When Johnson started in the industry 10 years ago, the Internet was in its infancy and played a very insignificant role in news organizations.
“At that time, nothing was online,” she recalls. “I joke about how that’s the time when we used to call people.”
Now, however, most jobs in journalism involve spending equal time writing stories as helping post those stories online, blogging, or shooting video at the scene of a news event. The importance of technology for today’s journalists cannot be understated, and the newspaper industry has come under fire for failing to adequately embrace the wave of the future. Though many fear technology to be a death knell for the industry, it should actually be embraced as an opportunity for improvement, according to Johnson.
“To know that I can write a column on Turkey and it’s read by Turks within 30 minutes – that’s never happened before. So, to have the reach that you do, and the opportunity for feedback through e-mail and comment boards, I think that never would have been possible without technology,” Johnson said, adding that such feedback can help improve journalists’ skills and help newspapers identify the topics that resonate most with readers.
“If newspapers do not fully enhance their online capabilities to match what some of these online news services have done for years now, they’re really going to be left in a lurch,” she said.
Jobs in journalism are dwindling at print publications but web-based news outlets offer plenty of opportunity for journalists to broaden their horizons, and for young reporters to get their start. For instance, Johnson balances her newspaper work with freelance writing for online and print outlets. It was a financial solution she reached after leaving newspapers to try a more lucrative magazine career, only to learn she missed the excitement of daily news and would take a pay cut to return. Ample stress accompanies the excitement, however, and there is often little time in the daily schedule for anything besides news. It’s a reality people should understand going in, Johnson said.
“If you want the 9-to-5 with the white picket fence, this is probably not the career for you,” she said. “It’s a lifestyle, and you have to know what you’re getting into.”

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