environmental journalist and winner of 3 Pulitzer Prizes, there are two
key things. The first one is the ability to write. “To be a good reporter,”
Schleifstein says, “you have to know how to write.”
The second thing is curiosity. He says that wherever you are you have to look around. Here in Fairbanks alone, he thinks, there are about 1000 story ideas for an environmental journalist like him.
Schleifstein also recommends to learn as much as you can about everything because you will always have to write on many different things as a
journalist, depending on what community you live in or what newspaper you
are writing for.
During the story he tells about a young journalist who asked the wrong
questions, it turns out that there are more than just two key things for
being a good reporter. It seems that it is also an important thing,
maybe the most important thing, to ask the right questions. How else
could you possibly find out what to write about, or if the thing you’re
writing is true or relevant. I think it wouldn’t help to just be a good
and curious writer. “You have to get the information out of someone,” he
says, “You have to ask what you don’t know.”
Concluding from his story about the young journalist, I would say the main
point he made about asking questions, is that you can’t only ask “What is
its name?” but you also have to ask “What is it?”, “Why is it there?”,
“Where does it come from?” “What is positive or negative about it?” and
“Is there a problem with it?”
The most important question, Schleifstein asks at the end of every
interview is “What haven’t I asked what I have ought to ask?” I will
certainly remember this one.
This all sounds very plausible and I think these are all important
qualities of a good journalist. But there is one more thing.
Schleifstein only mentions it at the end, but it seems to be the most
important to me.
It is experience.
It is the reason why the young reporter he told about, made all these mistakes. Mark Schleifstein’s experience has brought him far. In 1975, after
graduating from George Washington University, he started working as a
reporter. Twenty-two years later, he won his first Pulitzer Prize. Since
1984 he has worked at The Times-Picayune in New Orleans. For his stories
about Hurricane Katrina in 2006 he won two more Pulitzer Prizes.
He describes himself as a bad student, which is rather astonishing.
Mark Schleifstein has come a long way and had to collect many questions,
answers and a lot of experience to be where he is today.
That is what makes him a good reporter.
--Tina Dossegger
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