Nicole Harris, '07, Hopes Behind-the-Scenes Internships Will Lead to Job in the Spotlight

Nicole Harris, ’07, knows what she wants and takes deliberate steps to get it. The leadership studies and rhetoric and communications double major said that if she is to realize her dream of working in broadcast news, she must gain as much relevant experience as possible through externships and internships. 

Harris developed an interest in broadcast news at a young age, she said, in part because she often saw reporters interviewing her father, Kenneth N. Harris, Sr., a Baltimore, Md., city councilman. Harris became truly hooked when she met Stephanie Rochon, the co-anchor for the evening news on the CBS affiliate station WTVR Channel 6 in Richmond, Va.  

Rochon made a presentation during Harris’ sophomore year as part of a CIGNA Oliver Hill Scholars program that brought African-American professionals to campus to discuss career options with African-American students. “Stephanie Rochon became an inspiration to me,” said Harris, a CIGNA Oliver Hill Scholar. Harris decided to pursue a career in broadcast news.  

She gained her first real-world experience in broadcast news through an externship with WMAR Channel 2, an ABC affiliate in her hometown of Baltimore, Md., during the summer of 2005. She shadowed reporters and photographers and worked behind-the-scenes in the newsroom. 

The following summer Harris landed an internship with Baltimore’s WJZ Channel 13, a CBS affiliate, where she worked on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays with the station’s assignment desk and Internet department.  

Her duties at the assignment desk included helping editors determine which stories were newsworthy and then assisting with researching those stories and setting up interviews for the reporters.

Harris also spent much of her time at Channel 13 converting broadcast stories to print form for the Internet. Broadcast stories appear choppy if transcribed verbatim from spoken word to print, Harris said, so she edited stories to make them more readable before posting them to the Internet.  

Because she worked only part-time at Channel 13, Harris decided to tackle a second summer internship. On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, she worked in media communications at the Maryland corporate office of Blue Cross Blue Shield, writing press releases and Internet articles and doing some public relations work for corporate executives.  

Harris continues to build her resume during her senior year. This semester she is interning two days a week at WRIC Channel 8, the ABC affiliate in Richmond, Va., where she wants to learn more about producing and editing broadcast news programs.  

And she is already working on securing an internship for spring semester. If she succeeds in landing her first-choice internship, Harris will spend her last semester at the University of Richmond interning with Stephanie Rochon at WTVR Channel 6.  

Harris hopes that all her externship and internship experiences will help her secure a job as a broadcast news reporter, most likely in a small market such as the Eastern Shore initially, she said. But if this doesn’t develop, she may consider a career in public relations similar to the work she did for Blue Cross Blue Shield.

Harris credited her leadership studies major with honing her ability to communicate, interact and empathize with other people. “You can’t write a quality story about other people if you don’t fully understand their story,” she said.  

“My Jepson education has also helped me work with groups,” Harris said. “There are a lot of crazy people in newsrooms.”