Snippets from my work as a reporter at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln's news site, NewsNetNebraska.
You can see all of my work at NewsNetNebraska here.
Unpaid internships should be learning experiences, not free labor
University of Nebraska-Lincoln student Alec Schrad doesn’t mind spending her afternoons creating lesson plans and setting up play areas in her internship at the Lincoln Children’s Museum. In fact, she enjoys it, and she does it for free.
“I went into it unpaid knowing it was a good opportunity in general,” Schrad, an elementary education major, said. “It’s a really good learning opportunity to grow as a person and as a professional.”
Schrad feels that she has gained valuable experience from her unpaid internship and loves doing the work, but this hasn’t been the experience for many students in unpaid internships. In 2011, several interns who worked on the set of “Black Swan” sued Fox Searchlight on the grounds that they should have been paid for the jobs they filled on set, such as production assistants, janitors and secretaries. The lawsuit sparked a string of lawsuits against other major companies.
Read the full story here.
Students who commute struggle with parking on UNL campus
On a Monday at 11 a.m., Elliot Janssen, a sophomore at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, arrives on campus for his class at 11:30. At 11:10, he pulls in his regular parking lot, the C lot west of Memorial Stadium. After almost 10 minutes and three passes through the large lot without finding any spots, he moves on to a lot on the north side of the stadium. There, he quickly finds a spot and starts walking to class around 11:20. The whole process takes much longer than Janssen would prefer.
“I feel like every day I get to campus like half an hour early, and I’m just trolling around the commuter lots trying to find a spot for 20 minutes maybe,” he said. “Usually there’s like four or five cars doing the same thing.”
Many commuter students, faculty and staff have had troubles with parking on the UNL City Campus. First, theres’s the expensive prices of parking passes, then there’s simply finding a spot in time for class. However, UNL Parking and Transit Services is doing what they can to help.
Read the full story here.
Construction affects Lincoln businesses on P Street
The construction on P Street, which has been going on since September, has been blocking sidewalks and parking spaces in front of many businesses. Some business owners say that their business has been affected, but their biggest problem with the project is the lack of communication they have received from the City of Lincoln. NewsNetNebraska’s Jordan Kranse reports on how communication has changed during the project and how business owners feel about the construction.
Read the full story here.
Nebraska Diamond President John Tavlin pursues love for trumpet
The walls of the main room of John Tavlin’s basement are lined with trumpets, organized carefully by color. He will eagerly offer another trumpet player the chance to play one of his many horns and ask if he or she would like to do a little jazz improv. He speaks about the instrument like an old friend, one that he may not get along with all the time.
“When it works, it’s the greatest,” he said. “When it doesn’t work, it’s one of the most frustrating things that can possibly be.”
But despite his obvious enthusiasm for music and his experience with the horn, Tavlin’s primary career title isn’t “professional trumpet player.” The 64-year-old is the president and co-founder of Nebraska Diamond Sales Company. Though he still played professionally, his job prevented him from fully pursuing his passion and receiving formal training on the trumpet. Now that his role with his company is largely inactive, he has time to return to school to improve as a trumpet player.
Read the full story here.