vicwjmc

[vicwjmc]

7/12 - Departure

This day moved very quickly. We packed up, left our luggage outside, went to our final color group meeting, had our closing ceremony. It was bittersweet in a way, a fun week went by so fast. I’m incredibly thankful and lucky for the opportunity to attend WJMC. I learned a lot, made friends, and had a lot of fun. I’m considering GMU as a possible college. Maybe not undergrad, but I’m likely going to apply there for law school in the future.

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 6/7 - 6/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

7/11 - Part Two

Returning to campus, we had two hours to ourselves in our dorms. I used this time to pack up for tomorrow and prepare for the gala. The Marriott Hotel the gala was held at was actually pretty nice. Each color group got a fancy group photo.

Food was also good. I may have been the only person at my table who ate everything on each plate.

The dance itself occurred after this. I wasn’t able to spent much time in the room due to hearing sensitivity and all. It was nice to see everyone partying and overall having a good time. The gala did last really long though. The room where the dance floor was held at was shaking due to all the movement. A lot of pop songs were played that night.

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 6/7 - 6/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

7/11

The big day! The trip to the National Mall.

A Starship delivery bot I saw on the way to the dining hall plus breakfast.

I had taken a lot of photos this day, but I won’t post all of them because there’s just so many things to photograph and tumblr allows only thirty photos per post.

First I went to the U.S. Capitol, which probably one of the most beautiful buildings I’ve seen on the inside. The tour guide was very friendly and informative. The statues and paintings in the gallery were amazing.

An entire dump of some photos from the U.S. Capitol

After meeting up with some friends at the Sculpture Garden at the National Gallery of Art, we headed to the Smithsonian Natural History Museum. Unfortunately I couldn’t spend as much time as I’d would’ve liked there due to time constraints.

The Hope Diamond. It looks a lot better in-person than it does on my phone camera.

I was thankfully able to see the Birds of D.C. exhibit on the way out, which featured a multitude of eastern U.S. bird taxidermies, a lot of which I recognized from seeing in my home state.

I will have to continue this in another reblog due to amount of photos I want to show.

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 6/7 - 6/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

IMPORTANT NOTE

I realized I accidentally mislabeled the month. The correct date would be 7/7-7/10. Updates will be correctly labeled from now on.

Also I completely forgot that the cut function exists in Tumblr.

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 6/7 - 6/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

7/10

We stayed entirely on George Mason University campus this day.

Breakfast. I never actually ate the eggs during breakfast. Texture was a bit wet and I didn’t like that sensory-wise.

I had plenty of time in the morning as we weren’t going anywhere and did not need to go to the bus stop early, so I walked around campus a little. Some photos below.

First ever Panera purchase. v

There was a female house sparrow that had gotten into the building. I tried to catch her so I could release her, but ended up scaring her up a floor. I hope she got out.

Color group meeting, and off we went to see our next speaker: freelance photojournalist Anna Layden.

Her speech was really good, showing all the different photos she’s taken as well as the backstory of said photos. She didn’t have much tim, though, as she had to go photograph Ukrainian President Zelenskyy (NATO Summit).

Our next speaker was GMU Dean of Admissions Alan Byrd, whose speech focused on the college application process. It helped quite a bit in easing nerves about it (as I am writing this way after the conference, I have yet to submit a college application).

I got to go to Panera at lunchtime and it was actually really good. Plain latte plus a ciabatta cheesesteak. Wait was long due to the Panera being packed, but it was worth it.

I also purchased a Nessie Squishables plushie at the Barnes & Noble.

Next was the Newsroom Simulation in color groups. We were split into groups of two and assigned a role as well as a topic to report on (if we were reporters). The goal was to get your story published by editors. My partner and I were education(?) reporters and were to pitch a story about poor working and learning conditions in the local school system (ie rats, black mold, leaks). We were able to get our story published.

There was Capitol Hill preparations, which was mostly just forming plans for the next day.

Dinner was okay.

Next, career exploration/network mixup. Things were a bit bumpy though, as there was heavy rain and thunder, locking some students into their dorms until the weather cleared up. Other than that, things went smoothly.

The speaker I was assigned to was Bria Lloyd, an investigative reporter. She told us about her experience as an investigative journalist, things she’s covered, the process, etc. As of that day, she’s directing a new documentary. I think it’s going to take about two years? I’m excited to see how it’ll turn out. I was able to ask her a question one-on-one and take a group photo.

This moment didn’t make me want to peruse journalism as a career. Weirdly enough, it cemented my decision to peruse law, as Lloyd talked about how lawyers help with investigations in journalism (ie retrieving evidence and defending journalists if accused of libel).

Afterwards was the mix-up portion, where we could go to any speaker at this event and ask them questions. There was also a refreshments table.

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 6/7 - 6/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

6/9

This day is significantly less photo-heavy than the previous day.

Breakfast.

Bonus - The cool coffee machine on GMU Campus (Southside Dining Hall if anyone’s interested). Actually pretty good coffee. It had presets for making lattes and cappuccinos, but I didn’t want to know how long the milk had been there so I just stuck with regular black coffee with french vanilla creamer.

Afterwards, we went to Mason Square.

There, we listened to two speakers: Andria’s White Murdaugh from CBS 6 and Kevin McCarthy from FOX 5. McCarthy actually had a short recording prior to speaking at Mason Square. I think I remember our FA linking the full segment about McCarthy at WJMC. I was actually able to ask him a question, which was something along the lines of “what would you like to see in more media/films today?”.

Afterwards, we went to Nighthawk for lunch.

Our FAs allowed us to go to the local Target to shop, which was incredibly helpful for me as my sock had a hole in it and I forgot my suit jacket at home prior to coming to the conference.

Honestly the suit jacket was a little big, and most definitely did not match with my pants, but I needed it as we were heading to…

The National Press Club!

I don’t know which photos I can post, as earlier I read that photos in member-only spaces cannot be published, and I don’t know if we were in a members-only area.

The interior of the building was very nice though.

Our speakers for that time were Susan Goldberg, President and CEO of GBH, and Nicholas Johnston, the Publisher of Axios.

In her part, Goldberg showed us the trailer of 2023 film 20 Days in Mariupol, which was a documentary shedding light on Mariupol during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Something that stuck with me is how, upon accepting the Oscar award for the film, director Mstyslav Chernov says he wishes he could trade the award for Russia never invading Ukraine. I wish the crew behind the film had been able to come to WJMC as speakers.

Johnston’s part was pretty lighthearted. One quote I remember was along the lines of “there are very few places a politician can hide from a journalist with a press badge”, as he was talking about his time as a congressional reporter. I hope I got that correct.

Due to the NATO Summit, traffic was awful. At one point, we traveled nine miles within the span of one hour. The trip back was not fun.

Dinner was good. For experiencing DC traffic, I decided to treat myself to more desserts than I usually would eat (though I would come to regret this as eating that much was too sweet for me to handle. I did not waste any food though).

Final activity of the day was Color Feud. I have hearing sensitivity, so I couldn’t really participate much unfortunately as removing my earbuds would cause a lot of physical discomfort due to the noise in the room. I think Green got in the top three or top five? I can’t remember as I wasn’t really participating. I did stay in the room though for the entire duration.

(The question in second image was “what does a journalist never leave home without?”)

Each color group had formed their own chant. For example, Teal had “teal team six” and Silver’s incorporated squeezing a silver-colored sparkly glowing rubber ducky mascot.

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 6/7 - 6/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

6/8

I woke up around 6:00 AM and was greeted with one of the Starship delivery bots moving around. Our FA said we could try using the bot, but I never really did. It looked neat though.

The goodie bag we were provided with upon arriving at our dorm (it was there when I went in, but I didn’t take a photo of it until later). Surprisingly, the only WJMC-branded item was the water bottle. The bag is of George Mason University, while the clip and mini Capitol building squishie(?) is of the Schar School of Policy and Government.

Second image is of Horizon Hall, which is where we had our simulations. It’s a pretty beautiful building. There, we had the First Amendment Simulation. We were each assigned roles (mine was of a tired and overworked School Board member who didn’t really have any views on the issue in said simulation). It was actually really comedic.

(continued under cut)

We had lunch at Guapo’s in Arlington. Food was good. The tree inside was pretty.

We then went to Planet Word to listen to speaker Doni Holloway (who’s an alumni of both WJMC and a college in my state). Afterwords (pun), we went around the museum, three floors. Below are some photos.

Later we went to Dudley’s for dinner. If I’m being honest, it’s one of my favorite restaurants we went to during the conference.

Later that day, we had the Twilight Monument Tour, in which we toured the different monuments of DC. (Something of note (this is based off what I can remember) - during normal circumstances, the Twilight Monument Tour would have included the WWII Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, and going outside the White House. However, the 2024 NATO Summit was coming up, so we weren’t allowed anywhere near the White House. Instead, we went to the WWII Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, Vietnam Memorial, and Korean War Memorial.)

WWII Memorial.

Lincoln Memorial.

Korean War Memorial.

Vietnam War Memorial (at a very far distance).

Three Servicemen Statue (Fredrick Hart, 1984).

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 6/7 - 6/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

6/7

I didn’t take many photos this day. I came a little late (as most people did) and didn’t really have the energy to do much photography as I was leaving. Here’s a nice sunset photo I took of one building on-campus at George Mason University.

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 6/7 - 6/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

WJMC 2024 Photo Dump!! (Session 1, 7/7 - 7/12)

Hey I’m finally back! I’m aware that this is a month after the time I was there, but I got caught up with stuff in my personal life and didn’t find the time to update everything. I’ll be doing a photo dump plus some notes about the day. Hope you have fun reading :)

[vicwjmc]

Tired. Will update the last few days and tonight somewhere around tomorrow.

[vicwjmc]

Day 2/3

Apologies for not updating yesterday. I was very tired.

Day 2

In the morning, we had a simulation that centered around the First Amendment. The scenario was that a teacher had admitted that she purposefully alters AP scores as she gets a pay bonus for passes. The student journalists made a report on it, the principal had it censored, and now the school board has to decide if the report should be censored or if it can be released with no censorship.

My character was an overworked school board member raising their four young kids by themself while their spouse is deployed.

When the final verdict was made (the paper was to be released uncensored and the principal and assistant principal were to be investigated), I turned around and saw the person playing the principal doing this.

We later went to Planet Word and had some fun there. Journalist Doni Holloway was the speaker there.

We later went to tour the memorials. I visited the WWII Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Korean War Veterans Memorial, among other veteran statues.

Day 3

Our first speaker of the day was Andrias White Murdaugh, an event planner and journalist. Her speech was very upbeat and put a lot of focus on the youth correspondents. After that was Kevin McCarthy (not the one you’re thinking of m), a film critic on Fox 5. His speech was also very good.

We later went to the National Press Club and saw Susan Goldberg, President and CEO of GBH, and Nicholas Johnston.

[vicwjmc]

Also. Some stuff that was provided.

[vicwjmc]

Day 1, Sunday

It was good. The people there are nice, and the speaker was very interesting.

[vicwjmc]

About This Blog

Hello. This blog is made to journal and document my time at WJMC, as is required by the curriculum. There won’t be much here. Mostly photos I take while at the conference and some summaries. As of writing this, it is Saturday, the day before traveling to the conference. I’m pretty excited.

The photo used for my banner is a male northern cardinal I saw while at the NC Zoo.

Blog creation date: 7/6/2024