Armed with a notebook, a pen and a burning ambition to begin a new career— journalism—Frank Scotello pursued his story past the petrified moose, the giant polystyrene bulldog and the massive, 1,pound likeness of Elsie the Cow.
They are three-month wonders in Reader Inc. Thomson, the Stamford, Conn. Most attended college. One is a high school dropout. Two teach at the college level. Some have had multiple—and short-lived—careers, by choice and by unplanned circumstance. Seven are older than Now it is show time. The 16 journalists are heading to new careers at their hometown papers, acting on dreams to write, to change the world, to give voice to the disenfranchised or merely to escape jobs they had grown to loathe.
Wofford is a year-old utility infielder. She also worked in interior design, supervised drug and alcohol compliance for an airline, started her own cleaning and valet service and—between jobs—delivered the Appleton Post-Crescent, for whom she will start writing next week. The training in Oshkosh was free. Trainees would live in a dorm at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh. Surprisingly, there were no strings attached; people who completed the training had no obligation to stay at the papers that sent them—or to stay in journalism at all.
At 8 the next morning, in that byfoot space befitting a modern-day newsroom—Dilbert-like cubicles with computers, gray carpeting, antiseptic white walls, an overworked coffee machine—the training began. The Oshkosh training program is based on its British counterpart, launched in in Newcastle, England. Much of the training is standard Journalism , the demandingly intricate process of writing stories concisely and accurately. Woven throughout the training, as well, is a consistent reminder of polls indicating the public is losing faith in the media.
The newcomer journalists can relate. In the realm of newspaper chains, Thomson is at the same time both high and low profile. It owns 50 U. Reporters starting at small papers often leave after two or three years. Economically, they have little incentive to stay because the hours are long and the pay is lousy.
