Journalism Ambition: Writing the Right Way
By Wagner Mendoza
I’ve loved writing since I was in fourth grade. My sister was in her sophomore year of college and she told me how frightening her first year in college was. After being an over-achieving student in high school, she struggled with college writing. She told me that due to a lack of practice in high school, she did not feel fully-prepared to write at the college level. She urged me to read literature above my grade-level and to continuously practice my writing skills because it would be beneficial to me in the long run.
When I entered high school, my desire and hunger to write was bigger than ever. I looked for programs and internships to participate in. My first writing opportunity came when I was accepted into the Teens Reviewers and Critics program. My group and I watched theatrical performances, films, and modern art at museums that we later wrote about in our own reviews. My instructor and my peers were a great help in my ongoing journey to becoming a writer. In the writing programs I have been able to take part in, I have learned ways to structure my writing, edit correctly and compose more sophisticated pieces of writing in school and in my short-stories.
I dread math classes in school. The difficulty to memorize theorems and formulas and input them in quick quizzes and tests are not my strong suit. Because of my love for writing and reading, my history and English classes are heavens for me. Learning from past peoples’ mistakes and growing, as a human race throughout history is titillating and a great experience to have within the confines of a school classroom. Being able to relate to protagonists’ lives and problems in the literature read in my English classes help me adjust with the transition from adolescence into adulthood. After taking classes at school, I attend college courses at CUNY’s Queens College. Most recently, having taken political science has helped me meet deadlines, learn of the political and economic aspects of our world and has made me a more aware person. I am now able to form deeper understandings of how industries, economies, government agencies all come together to run countries. The classes I take are helping me mature as a writer and person.
I want to become a journalist to develop understandings of the world around me and provide insight to the people reading my work. I want to serve as the eyes and ears to my audience; to help them see and read true and unbiased information about the world around them.#
