Opinion: ‘What am I doing here?’: A perspective on community journalism

Burnaby Beacon summer intern, Curtis Seufert, reflects on his experience in our newsroom over the past several weeks, as his time with us comes to an end. If you’d like to revisit and re-read Curtis’s work with the Beacon, check out his author page here.

To be honest, I wondered whether I was out of my depth when I first joined the Burnaby Beacon.

Sure, I already had some experience writing local stories with the Vancouver-based The/La Source newspaper for the past few years. But those were mostly in the realm of artist profiles and music features. So, coming into the Beacon this past May, I knew that a full-scale internship would involve a lot more in terms of both expectations and responsibilities.

More articles, more often, on all sorts of topics I had never touched before, and all of it in a city that—only now do I feel comfortable sharing—as a Vancouverite, I didn’t know a lot about beforehand.

So while It’s been an interesting and exciting time covering all manner of community news with the Beacon, I’ve found myself asking, “What exactly am I doing here?”

That question has taken many forms over the course of this internship: What am I supposed to be covering, exactly? What should I be on the lookout for? What needs to be shared with the people here? And, last but not least, who the heck thought it was a good idea to hire me?

After about 12 weeks and nearly 20 stories, what I’ve come to learn is that, for community journalists, there’s rarely a simple answer to any of those questions. Except maybe the last one—I think you can pin that on Simran.

Jokes aside, as I finish the final day of my internship with this lovely team, covering this amazing city, I’ve noticed the tone of that question in my head becoming increasingly excited and curious rather than uncertain and anxious.

And what I’ve realized is that, while the question might feel more pertinent to me, as a novice reporter and Burnaby newcomer, it’s a question that community journalists of all stripes should be asking themselves no matter where they are in their career.

In a way, “What am I doing here?” is perhaps one of the best guiding questions you can ask yourself as a local reporter: What is it that I’m trying to explain? How does the angle I’m covering fit into broader conversations about this issue? How am I helping people to fully understand an issue? And why is this important to the community I’m writing for?

These questions are especially important when it comes to community news, since local journalists and outlets have an even bigger influence on public discourse.

When it comes to national or international news, there’s often a whole host of outlets covering the same issue. But with community reporting, people might only have one or two options for coverage of news that’s happening in their community.

In fact, with the decline of local journalism, you might be lucky to have a printer newspaper at all, depending on where you live.

Local outlets have an outsized impact on deciding what is “worthy” of the public’s attention. So when people are wondering whether one environmental group is doing more “important” work than another, or if one city council motion has a “bigger” impact on residents than the rest of the agenda, it’s often up to a handful of community publications and reporters to provide the public with an informed answer.

It goes without saying that this is a big responsibility for any journalist, let alone for someone who’s just entering the field. But as intimidating as it is, what I’ve learned is that you can start to get better answers once you become a part of the community you’re covering.

And while it would be a bold thing to say that I’ve become a part of Burnaby, looking back I’m so glad I decided to continue covering this place throughout my whole internship period this summer.

As someone who’s been looking to build both my skills and my connections as a journalist these last few months, I had to decide whether it would be best to extend my amazing time with Beacon through to August, or to try for other internship opportunities halfway through.

Both options had their pros and cons—who knows what new experience I could have had with a different outlet? But in the end, it was best for me to spend a few more weeks learning about Burnaby, talking to its people, and writing stories that I felt, with increasing confidence, were important to this community.

Partly, I chose to stay because I genuinely did love working here—Simran, Marco, Srushti and Dustin have all been such amazing journalists to work with and learn from. But I also stayed because I knew that building an understanding of what’s most important to a community is a process that takes time, and that is so essential when navigating the great responsibility of being a community journalist.

By the end of my internship, most of the questions I’ve listed throughout this article still remain—but that’s probably a good thing, because they’re questions that I and other journalists should always be asking ourselves.

And despite the lack of answers, and having much more left to learn, I honestly no longer feel like I’m out of my depth. At least, not entirely.