By: Isabelle Yang, Copy Editor and Michaela Gonzalez, Co-Editor-In-Chief
Our names are Michaela and Isabelle, and we were participants in the School of the New York Times program this past summer. Spending 2 weeks alone in New York City with complete strangers taught us about a world outside of Millbrae while learning about journalism from industry professionals animated our passion for learning and writing stories. Here is what our experiences were like:
Michaela’s perspective:
My name is Michaela Gonzalez, and my time in New York City this past summer was the most eye-opening experience of my life. Writing in the Big City was the class I took while participating in the School of the New York Times (SoNYT). Spending two weeks alone in New York and meeting people from all around the world showed me the vastness of stories beyond my own.
I had been to New York a few days before, but nothing could have prepared me for this experience. I walked from the Columbus Circle subway station in the muggy heat with my suitcase, backpack, tote bag, and “New York, New York” looping in my headphones. Over 500 high school students stayed at Fordham University, which meant friend groups were forming fast. After I met my roommates (Emily was from Truckee, CA, and Serena was from Beijing, China), we met the rest of our 20th-floor community. This was when I began to meet my classmates, but also when I learned of other courses offered: Fashion, Photography, and Film, Inside the U.N, Sports Marketing, Creative Writing, and Public Policy and Activism, to name a few.
Through the next two weeks, my class, Writing in the Big City, touched on broad journalism elements such as learning how to write food reviews from Pete Wells, a food critic who famously slammed Guy Fieri’s Manhattan restaurant in 2012. We also learned how to write profile articles; for this, we interviewed Erica Pandey, a Senior Reporter at the publication Axios. Our professor for the entire course was Seth Kugel, a travel writer for the New York Times, who has a travel column called Tripped Up. Every class had a final project, and ours was to write a news story about the community in Jackson Heights in Queens. My group and I wrote about police criminalizing street vending pictures.
Although I loved learning about stories and how to report, a big takeaway from this experience was having the liberty to travel anywhere in Manhattan (in the span of 2 hours). Classes usually ended at around 4, so from 5 until our 9 o’clock curfew, my friends and I would take a subway ride to The Met, Washington Square Park, the Lower East Side, Soho, and even Brooklyn. Often, the school would plan outings, like when we saw New York, New York on Broadway, the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens, and a tour of the New York Times Building!
New York reveals the true highs and lows of life. Journalism shows the beauty of interpreting other’s stories. I fell in love with both all over again
Isabelle’s perspective
My name is Isabelle Yang, and this past summer, I attended the School of New York Times, taking a class called Writing in the Big City. From exploring the Upper West Side for our final project to laughing with my roommates, Maria from Puerto Rico and Jiaying from LA, my experience in New York was a core memory that will stay with me forever.
Those two weeks were filled with unique opportunities and have significantly impacted my life in various ways, as the people I met there will be lifelong friends, and the knowledge I’ve gained will assist me throughout my academic career. In addition, traveling to New York alone allowed me to have a chance to be independent in a busy city full of life.
Although I was new to the journalism world, I was interested in writing and was eager to learn more about journalism specifically. When I got the opportunity to go to SoNYT, it allowed me to discover a new passion for journalism and introduced the basics of this career.
Throughout the term, our professor, Ari Goldman, taught us about the structure of a news article, how to interview, and how a newsroom runs. Along with doing activities in the classroom, we also got multiple opportunities to put the skills we learned into practice. My professor took us on tours of several Upper West Side monuments, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of the City of New York, and Columbia University’s Journalism Graduate School, creating assignments that challenged us to use what we learned in the classroom. Furthermore, the guest speakers were employed NYT writers and professionals with an abundance of information and impressive backgrounds in the field of journalism.
Our final project was to choose a monument in the Upper West Side and form a news story. We were required to uncover any current news by interviewing people at the site and researching. This highlighted everything we had learned throughout the term and demonstrated the entire process of writing and publishing a news article in the real world. I am beyond grateful for this life-changing experience and will cherish the memories I have from the School of New York Times forever.
Overall, we recommend this experience to any Mills student, interested in journalism or not, to check out this amazing program. To look at last year’s programs and find out more information, scan this QR code. Good luck and anyone can contact us for any questions about SoNYT!
