By Matt Speakman
BIRMINGHAM, Alabama — A panel of student journalists reflected on the current issues in print and digital media at the Associated Press Sports Editors Southeast Region convention on Monday at Samford University.
Alabama’s Terrin Waack, Samford’s Noel Espinal and Georgia’s Wilson Alexander took questions from moderator Welch Suggs, a professor at Georgia, as well as other fellow sports journalists.
All three students provided perspective on how they consume news and how they think sports media will change in the future. As expected, Twitter was a popular answer, along with the ESPN App, as ways to discover news.
The students said that they find time during their day to scroll through Twitter and read sports media. Twitter is their preferred vessel to find the news that they want. Alexander and Waack expressed a love for long-form journalism, which they can read on the bus to class or in bed after the day is over.
“On the way to class, I’ll read on the bus,” Waack said. “I did it on the train all of the time (last summer when interning for the Chicago Tribune). That’s where I read magazines a lot too.”
The conversation progressed into a question about what sports media they pay for. Wilson expressed an interested in The Athletic because of its look and feel. The Athletic is a new medium for consuming sports content with a subscription-based, ad-free website.
With the conversation about The Athletic arising, the future of sports media began to be discussed. In the last 10 years, sports media has moved rapidly in the direction of digital content and away from print. Wilson, Waack and Espinal will be a part of the new wave of journalists, tasked with helping reinvent the trade.
Since the state of media has changed so rapidly, Alexander said he cannot predict what the future would like.
“It’s impossible to predict,” he said. “Maybe I’m optimistic, but people want these things. They will always want sports coverage. They will always want long-form. They will always want breaking news.”
Wilson and Waack will enter the work force soon, while Espinal will have two more years to build her portfolio as a broadcast journalist.
All three students have worked to build resumes while in college, with Waack and Alexander working for professional print publications and Espinal establishing herself as a color commentator for the Samford women’s volleyball team. All three students agreed that their experiences have been extremely valuable.
