If you are serious in a career in Sports Journalism, I might just have the opportunity you have been waiting for. I had the privilege of attending Penn State’s Sports Journalism camp earlier this month. (July 20-24). Wow, what an experience it was. The first day we got there we had the opportunity to cover the State College Spikes baseball game. Now, for anyone who doesn’t know, the Spikes are the Class A affiliate of the Pittsburgh Pirates. They are part of the NY-Penn League. It’s safe to say that the Spikes are no ’27 Yankees, witness their 9-29 record, put they did put up a good fight, even though they lost 13-5 to the Jamestown Jammers. Who, by the way are the best team in the league. So we got to cover the game, take scores, write down statistics and facts, and heck we even sang Take Me out to the Ballgame.
  Over the course of the week we wrote three stories apiece for the newspaper we were putting together. We were divided into four groups to work on the paper. Basically our days went like this. Got up, showered, walk to the Commons, ate breakfast. Then walked to Carnegie Hall to hear some kind of lecture ranging from Sports Photography, Multimedia Relations, Jobs in Sports, and Why do we Cover Sports? Then usually in the afternoon we would eat lunch then tour one of Penn State’s sports facilities. For example, one day we got to tour Beaver Stadium. Now, let me just say what an experience that was. We got to walk through Penn State’s locker room, sit in the media room, and even go up to the press box. By the way, the press box is not that impressive at all, which I was surprised about. Nevertheless, the coolest thing we did was run out the Penn State tunnel onto the field. What a rush that was? We also toured the Penn State all-sports museum, which is located inside Beaver Stadium. I thought that was pretty neat. I did a story on Penn State baseball history from the facts and information I gathered at the museum. Another day we toured the Bryce Jordan Center. It's your typical sports arena, nothing special. We got to walk down onto the court which was pretty neat. We also saw the basketball practice facilities as well. Now the next thing I experienced was one of the coolest things ever. We got have an actual press conference with Jay Paterno, the quarterbacks coach. Jay to my surprise was a really down-to-earth guy, who answered every question thrown his way. Even the controversial questions like, what happened to Terrelle Pryor? Or when is your Dad retiring? He was gracious with every question. Then he showed us around the football facilities including their state-of-the-art gym, and indoor practice facilities. While we were there we got to witness a practice, which was neat.  He actually introduced us to Derrick Williams, star wide receiver, and quarterback Pat Devlin.
  Overall, it was a great time and an awesome experience. I highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in pursuing this field. I learned so much more about certain techniques journalists use and how to just become a better writer in general. Not to mention meeting new people from around the country who all share the same passion for sports and writing.  Penn State is one of the few schools in the nation that has a Sports Journalism Department. So if this sounds like your thing try it out. If anyone has any questions about the program you can either contact me via e-mail or check out the website below. 

http://www.comm.psu.edu/sports/

Here's what the Agenda looked liked: