Kate Sheppard

Kate Sheppard of Mother Jones recently visited Ithaca College and will be there once again next week on behalf of Mother Jones to accept the Park School's Izzy Award for their achievements in Independent media. Sheppard is the model for the ideal career of today's journalism grad. With the mainstream media constantly making cuts to their staff, independent media is becoming the way to go for young journalists. Truth be told, schooling isn't necessary to become a journalist anymore. All you need is a blog and one groundbreaking post to grab the attention of readers, then it becomes the journalist's job to keep those fans coming back with entertaining/factual/non biased reporting. 

Her career path is the model for independent journalists. Out of college she had a couple of what she called "glorified internships." Not the traditional summer internship an undergrad would take with either minimal or no pay. Her "internships" were at independent outlets that let her showcase her skills as well as learn new forms of media, such as video and other multimedia aspects of the industry. After her internships, she was hired as a Washington correspondent for Mother Jones. She doesn't only right about politics and government, she handles environmental topics as well. Her reason for being in Ithaca a week before she is scheduled to receive Mother Jones' Izzy Award is to handle an article regarding fracking, a popular topic of late in Ithaca and other parts of central New York. 

Sheppard should be every young, aspiring journalist's hero. Her story is inspiring and sheds light on an industry that has received heavy criticism in both the independent and mainstream sectors.