I interviewed John Oakey, a news anchor in the morning at the KETV news station in Omaha, Nebraska.

He became interested in journalism at a fairly young age of 12. He was always curious and aware of the things going around him locally, nationally, and worldwide. Oakey broke into the field during college at a PBS station on the campus of Texas A&M. He interned at CNN in Atlanta with Sports his junior year of college and returned to Texas his senior year to work behind the scenes at the local CBS affiliate.

Oakey defines good journalism as " telling the story right and telling both sides". He feels his news organization practices "good" journalism most of the time, owned by Hearst. He feels they are great at live coverage. Oakey has a sufficient amount of freedom to do the types of stories he thinks are profitable for the community, educational and life-style issues as well as human interest stories.

According to Oakey, his station, KETV, is very invovled in the community. They support countless non-profit groups. There is a line for community members called "7 Can Help" which provides as an outlet for their story ideas and problems the public is facing.

He feels if he is able to tell others' stories and get people to connect, then he has done his job well. "It could as simple as telling about a little boy struggling through health issues and the community answers by donating to help pay bills."

Oakey believes journalism has changed a lot over the past 20 years. Technology has changed the way he's done things, but also been a tremendous help. When asked about dropping ciruclations, ratings, and layoffs because of growing citizen journalism Oakey felt newspapers were feeling the pangs of it more so than broadcasting, as well as smaller tv groups.

"We are actually growing and hiring. Hearst has been a great owner and our ratings continue to be strong. There are challenges, but we have done a great job of adapting and put a lot of emphasis on the web as well.

When providing advice to students wanting to go into journalism Oakey jokingly advised not to. On a more serious note, he said that broadcasting is a tough business. There are few jobs and many people seeking to "get on TV". His advice was to diversify and learn about as many aspects of broadcast/print as possible. Know how to write for print, TV, the web. How to shoot video and edit it.


I found John Oakey's comments very informative. I was actually surprised when he advised not to go into broadcasting and/or journalism. It seems as if everyone I talk to and in each of my journalism classes that they are advising against going into the profession they are in/or teaching. Often I leave classes feeling as if my future career is doomed for poor pay and listed as an "endangered species". I have a feeling that this outlook will not change, and it will probably be reinforced more so as I get further into the program.