Soledad Says...

For those who missed it, here is a quick recap of the Soledad O'Brien speech on diversity that was held at the University of Cincinnati on Monday evening.

You can read the full article, written by UC SPJ president Taylor Dungjen, at the News Record website.

Here are some notable quotes Taylor sent along as well:

“Don’t be afraid at how bad the market is. When I was first leaving school in 1988 I was told by the people you will never get a job, the evening news cast is dead and nobody’s watching. I’ve been in the business for 21, going on 22 years. Not bad for a girl who wasn’t supposed to be able to be employed. There’s opportunity in chaos and there’s a lot of chaos. Everywhere I go I have to Twitter, I have to blog and you do that naturally. I would argue that you’re in a good position. You all have to shoot on your own, you have a camera. My niece, my eight-year-old daughter, can work so much more technology than I can … The foundation still is what’s most important; reporting accurately and with fairness.”

“Anything that I have done badly in my job, that was me failing in some way: I didn’t do the work I should have done, it wasn’t because I was a girl or a minority. I didn’t do the work, that was the first thing. I guess I just try to outwork people and do such a good job that the fact that people had expectations that would just melt away … I used to be a terrible reporter in San Francisco. I would cover every single fire story and all the calls come at 2 a.m. and I didn’t do it because I wanted to, but because I knew I needed to do 100 before I got it right. Now I can do fire stories in my sleep ‘It began after 5 a.m. duh duh duh … The value was out working people so I would get better.’ ”

“I think you have to do internships first to see what you like and don’t like. Just grill people on ‘How did you get here, how did you start?’ What’s great about the age that you are is you’re willing to sleep on a friends couches. At 43 I’m done with that. When I was 20 I could, I worked that way. I shared with a friend, I lived in some of the most awful apartments but they were cheap.”

Enjoy!

Special thanks goes to Taylor Dungjen and our friends at UC!