Newscast #4 - Jonah Marcum - Fall 2016

Jackson Lilly

November 8, 2016

| Tuesday, February 28, 2017

The moment was finally happening that I’ve waited for my whole life: I anchor for sports in a newscast.

The week of my first anchor show, there were so many emotions. Honestly, it was one of the most stressful weeks of my life. I had a tailgating story about a four-generation family that attended West Virginia University that treats tailgating much more than just celebrating an American pastime. I was in the edit lab making edits of b-roll and VO, then I had interviews to edit. Somehow, no audio came out in any of my interviews and panicking was an understatement of how I was feeling. Luckily, I was able to cover another story about WVU’s Mini Day of Play. (Major shout-out to Nikki Kaye for allowing me to do her next story.) This all happened just on Monday.

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I was praying that I was able to make the best of this. I was thankful to just be alive the next day. This class was my first exposure working for a newscast. So, my thought process was all over the place. At first, there was nothing but panic, anxiety, stress, anger, etc. After I was able to edit my 11th hour story, I finally calmed down and realized that this experience taught me how to handle stress and be ready when life really hits you hard.

Hours after I made my final edits, I had to go to script read through with the rest of the cast for this week. I was so stressed out that I didn’t even think about anchoring. So, read-throughs ended and we all parted our ways. I was pacing back and forth in my apartment full of more anxiety. I thought to myself, “Jonah, you’re about to do what you’ve been dreaming of since you were little.” Through hours of practicing and researching previous anchors I was able to go to sleep at 3 am.

The day has finally come ANCHOR DAY! Even though I got 4 hours of sleep, I was full of excitement

. I was ready to take on this new important step in my young journalism career. I arrived at the studio

and was ear-to-ear smiling. Just moments before my first take, I prayed that I was able to make a great

first impression. I wanted to do my best in anchoring since my week was full of stress. Then, I sat down

and was ready to anchor.

There were a few hiccups, but after the first few takes, I felt comfortable. Fourth time was the charm. When I got off the chair and it was all over, it was one of the most proud moments of my life. None of this would have been possible without the help of my parents calming me down all week. Also, I want to thank our amazing cast, TA’s, and Dahlia for believing in me. I’m so excited for the next anchor set, but the work still continues!