gardner_chase2012

Chase Gardner

CHASE GARDNER

4563 Wheelhouse courtOrlando, FL [email protected](407) 770-8220

May 25, 2012

Tim StephensSports Topic EditorOrlando Sentinel633 N. Orange AvenueOrlando,FL 32801

Dear Mr. Stephens,

I have been a fan of the sports section of the Sentinel for years and I would like to join the legacy. I am extremely responsible and reliable with task and have a firm understanding of the sports world.

As the social media editor of my school newspaper I am up to date with tech-nology and my young ideas will be beneficial to the paper’s success with the younger population. I am talented in sports writing and understand what I takes to be a writer. I know how to use multiple programs like In-design and Photoshop.

I work well in teams do to years of actually playing sports and being on a writ-ing staff for years. In my years of sports playing I’ve learned the terminology and rules which directly correlates with my writing and i have learned disci-pline so i will follow orders well.

The enclosed resume will elaborate more on my experience and backround but i personally feel that a piece of paper won’t allow you to really understand my expericence and abilities so i feel an interview would be a good oppurtu-nity to express my further interest. I look foward to hearing from you shortly.

BCGOBJECTIVETo work in a proffesional setting and learn from writers so i can further my abilities.

EDUCATIONCompleted 3 years at Boone High SchoolG.P.A 2.3 unweighted

EXPERIENCENewspaer staff member, Boone High School

• August-present. Social Media editor

RELEVENT HIGH SCHOOL COURSES• Tv production 1 & 2

AWARDS AND HONORS• Good citizenship award presented by Val Demmings

Journalism has proven to be one of the high-lights to my high school experience. It’s im-proved my grammar and English speaking skills. With the responsibility of journalism it has drastically effected my work ethic making me more focused on projects.

I got started in journalism sophomore year to improve my writing skills because I sought a future career in broadcasting. I never thought of the amount of hard work and dedication it takes to go down the path of a journalist. Shortly after being in journalism, my career plans had definitely changed.

Journalism has forced me to adapt at a very quick pace, in a matter of minutes your assign-ment can change because news never stops. In the first year of journalism I was forced to become more organized and more responsible because if you fail to do your job, everyone is affected by your laziness and irresponsibility. I had to study different software on the comput-ers that would become part of my daily rou-tine.

In journalism I have contributed ideas for the advancement of the school newspaper and website. I formed a new sports column for the online newspaper called “Chasing Gold”. With technology drastically affecting how the news works, I suggested the idea of live Twitter feeds for sporting events and Facebook conclusions.

After graduation I hope to continue written journalism for ESPN or become an in the field war reporter for nightly news. Even if I fail to achieve these goal, my time in journalism would not be in vain. The skills learned and discipline acquired with the need to meet a deadline will prove valuable in any career path.

Personal Ess

ay

This year in mass media I’ve learned several key methods that have im-proved my writing ability and disci-pline. With the enforcement of dead-lines on my work it has forced me to adapt from slacker tendencies from early years. Seeing the flowing mo-tion of an advanced staff have rubbed off and honed my skills as a journalist. The skills learnt here will forever af-fect my ability in the workplace do to the amount of responsibility needed to be a part of the staff. The team-work has improved personal skills and respect for other staffers and im-proved people skills.

Self-analy

tical evalu

ation

Reflection 1

This is my favorite piece of work I did this year because I get to poke fun at athletes and really express my opinion on the decisions of teams. This is part of my column “Chasing Gold” and is the only story that uses multiple sports in one story. The first draft of this story included 3 extra topics but those were later edited out because it was too long for a web story. This was an easy story to write because I had fun writing it because sports is a topic I am interested in. The process of writing this story included thinking of categories and narrow down who I thought was the most deserving of each award.

Reflection 2

I consider this piece on veterans day something that could still use work because this was my first news article. Looking back on this story and with all the things I have learned since then I feel I could improve this if I were to rewrite it. I was stressed out over this piece because until this I only did columns and I didn’t know how to approach this. I went back for interviews constantly because I would think of another good ques-tion right after I left the room. If I had the opportunity to rewrite this story, I would fix the lead because it is too long for a news lead.

This is my favorite picture mainly because of all the action shown. It shows the struggle and raw determination from a player trying to get the job down by any needs necessary. This photo uses the rule of thirds and also utilizes leading lines with the two Winter Park players chasing the quarterback. I also like this picture because of the depth of field with the bleachers behind the players blurred and the players in focus.

Reflectio

n 3

I believe I was an asset to the staff of hilights.org because with the year I’ve been on staff, I’ve run the papers twitter and wrote multiple stories for the online site. I have committed time to writing stories and helping with distribution of the yearbooks as well as the newspapers.I stay after school in order to meet dead-lines and make sure I am doing my part to keep hilights.org updated. I go to sporting events to tweet the games and do my part to increase the popularity of the websites twitter and facebook.

Reflection 4

This year was stressful due to the fact I wasn’t used to the responsibility of a journalist and the necessity to meet a deadline. I made mistakes like forgetting when a deadline was because of other things going on but I have corrected this because I’ve started writing down my assign-ments in a planner so I always stay on task and meet deadline. I’ve handled most other situation fine though because I’ve only spent a year on mass media’s staff so I haven’t been put through the ringer.

Reflectio

n 5

I said my greatest weakness was procrastination but since then I have been working on fixing that by forc-ing myself to work on the assign-ments given to me as soon as I get them. I have been writing down my objectives and when I plan n finishing them because if I let myself down by not working on my articles, I let the entire staff down as well as my advi-sor. I feel like I have truly improved by doing these things because I meet deadline and still have time for work in other classes and outside of school activities.

Reflectio

n 6

DM30-I want to enter this piece because it’s a per-sonal favorite of mine. I feel I was really able to express my opinion in this story more than my other “Chasing Golds” because it was an award type story. I got inspiration for this story mainly from the similar stories on espn.com.

I want to enter this piece because while I feel it could use some work I still think it was one of my better pieces because I enjoyed writing on this topic. I out a lot extra into this story because I wanted it to radiate respect for our troops.

Reflectio

n 7

I want to enter this photo gallery because it has some of my favorite pictures I have ever taken. I was able to utilize unique angles to capture great action shots and for certain pictures it gives the illusion that the viewer was actually there.

Reflection 7

cont..

http://hilights.smugmug.com/Sports/2011-12-BHS-Hi-Lights/Weightlift-ing-1-25/21212280_zHkjSr#!i=1688224749&k=HhxJGzq

http://hilights.smugmug.com/Sports/2011-12-BHS-Hi-Lights/Faculty-Student-Basket-ball-4/22664683_p3bwP3#!i=1815817146&k=d25M7Gr

http://hilights.smugmug.com/Sports/2011-12-BHS-Hi-Lights/Varsity-Wrestling/20999952_6ZqTNM#!p=1&n=24

http://hilights.org/archives/4434

http://hilights.smugmug.com/Sports/2011-12-BHS-Hi-Lights/Flag-Foot-ball-2-20/22058859_dxHcm2#!i=1760369064&k=pvGJbGQ