During the winter overseas language training at the University of Hawaii in Manoa (UH), we had a chance to have a tour of the UH media and also an interview with the UH newspaper journalist, Nicole Kim, who is working for the campus newspaper 'Kaleo'.

Can you introduce yourself to the CWNU readers?

My name is Nicole Kim. I am a freshman in the journalism department in the University of Hawaii in Manoa. I also work as an assistant editor here since August in 'Kaleo' which means 'The Voice' in Hawaiian language. My job is to do a lot of online stuff such as assisting the web editor with the web page. I also write articles and video tape interviews but usually I work on the web page, such as Facebook, Twitter, the website and other things that need to be done for the web.

What was the motivation for you to work for Kaleo?

I’ve wanted to be a news anchor one day since I was in elementary school. My motivation for working for Kaleo actually started because my department recommends students in the journalism department to join Kaleo because you can learn so much about journalism in practice here in Kaleo. So I would say, why I came to Kaleo is to gain experience from other seniors with great experience and slowly build my portfolio for my future.

When do you feel proud of working as a journalist in Kaleo?

I can't clearly answer your question because it’s been only a half a month since I started working here. I haven't had a breakthrough moment yet . However, everyday working here is a new experience and I think that every day is meaningful here by meeting new people and learning more about journalism in practice and with great co-workers.

Did you face any kind of difficulties working as a journalist?

I have difficulties when interviewing people. Sometimes interviews don't go through and sometimes there are some rude people out there who would not want to be interviewed. I would say that difficulties we face are different from every journalist because some are really good with interviews and some are very creative with ideas and writing the piece and putting together the piece. To be a journalist, you have to be flexible with what is given to you for the reader.

What was the most interesting piece you have written so far?

I have written about 50 articles with videos and the most interesting piece was an earlier piece which was about diabetes. There was a researcher who came to the UH campus center who discovered that you could detect diabetes ahead of time. So with my co-worker, I went to the cancer center in town and we had the chance to see the medical lab and all the research that they were doing

What is your plan from now on?

I want to improve my writing even further to make more solid pieces and do better reporting and also try to learn as much as possible with the people I work with because they are very experienced. Also in this summer, I am trying to get an internship at a local paper which would help me to improve myself as a journalist.

Jeong Seung-In  samcandothat@naver.com

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