George Solomon: A Year in Review

One of the highlights of the 2015 fall semester at the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism occurred at the December commencement. The speaker that day was Thomas Bettag, a veteran television news producer (27 years with CBS, ABC and CNN) who graced the college and broadcast students the past four months as a visiting fellow with his wisdom and guiding hand.

Bettag, aware of the difficult job market and uncertain future for the students and parents he was addressing, took his remarks to a level that moved beyond the presentation of diplomas and first-job prospects.

“Your children have signed on to a higher standard,” Bettag said. “They face a challenging future. But they’re infected and there is no cure…”

By higher standard, Bettag was referring to the graduates striving to meet a level of excellence of work, effort and ethics as they step into a new, uncertain media world. If declining newspaper circulation and dramatic staff reductions cloud the future of many major news organizations, new forms of providing news to broadcast outlets and online and mobile sites provide hope to those preparing the next generation of journalists.

“A changing future” is how Bettag described the coming decades facing graduates. “A promising job market” was the tone of a recent Merrill College faculty meeting, noting growing online outlets and small-market television and radio opportunities.

I love the optimism of my Merrill College colleagues and admire Bettag setting the bar high for students.   But after a year of reading about out-of-work journalists, declining newspaper circulation, buyouts, staff reductions at many news organizations, including media giant ESPN, who can forecast the future of the sports media business?

What I do know for certain is the fact that many young people of high school and college age still crave a chance at being part of the business.  In what form?  That’s a question to be answered in the future.

What I do know is young people still read (often from their phones), admire good journalism and aspire to be quality, objective journalists demonstrated so well in the movie “Spotlight.”

There also are risk-takers, such a Kevin Merida, who left his job as a Managing Editor of The Washington Post to become editor-in-chief for ESPN’s yet-to-launch website, “The Undefeated,” that aims in the near future to produce meaningful stories on race and sports. Not to mention the hundreds of young journalists throughout the country who write sports for web sites (often without compensation) for experience, with the dream of a career doing something they love.

They have hope. So do we.

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The Shirley Povich Center for Sports Journalism at the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism’s recently concluded its fall semester, featuring a number of panels and the 10^th annual Shirley Povich Symposium on “Sportswriting Then and Now.” Maury Povich moderated a panel that included ESPN’s Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon, USA Today columnist Christine Brennan, The Washington Post’s Sally Jenkins and Chelsea Janes, Jeremy Schaap of ESPN and former Washington Post publisher Donald Graham.

Earlier in the day of the Symposium, the Center gave its “Distinguished Terrapin” awards to ESPN’s  Pam Ward and Tim Kurkjian, as well as special recognition  to longtime Maryland Sports Information Director Jack Zane.

The Center and college teamed with the Newseum for a third year with a panel of sports media critics  that included  Kevin Blackistone of the Merrill College faculty, ESPN and The Washington Post, author Mark Hyman, Christy Winters-Scott of the Big Ten Network, ESPN public editor Jim Brady, Dan Steinberg of The Washington Post and Christine Brennan of USA Today.

Maryland alumnus Scott Van Pelt, an ESPN anchor and commentator, visited the college on November 17 to talk with Merrill College students before working the Georgetown-Maryland game later that evening. The previous month saw a discussion on women in sports, after the World Cup, that included a panel of USA Today Sports Editor David Meeks, Maryland’s Associate Athletic Director Kelly Mehrtens and point guard Chloe Pavlech, D.C. United executive Lindsay Simpson and Christy Winters-Scott.

The spring semester of 2016 will feature the third annual Sam Lacy-Wendell Smith luncheon, the eighth annual Shirley Povich Workshop for high school and college journalism students and panel discussions on the job market, soccer’s future and the second careers of professional athletes. The third annual Shirley Povich  Sports Journalism Summer camp will be held in July.