Internship profiles

Scales interns at three sports shows

According to Iowa native Tom Arnold, University of Iowa senior Isaiah Scales is the best damn intern. Period.

Scales interned at FOX’s corporate studios in Los Angeles in the summer of 2004, working on three sports shows: “The Best Damn Sports Show Period,” “FSN Across America” and “Highlights.” Scales composed video packages and did some script writing for the programs.

With “The Best Damn Sports Show Period,” Scales worked with Arnold, and he and Arnold share a hometown: Ottumwa, Iowa. Scales even graduated from high school with Arnold’s nephew. Arnold was proud of Scales for taking a chance and coming to L.A.

“He had heard from the different people I was working with and that I was doing a great job for them,” Scales said. “He actually told me that if he had heard otherwise, he was going to get on me. He said he wanted me to excel out there.”

Last summer was the first time FOX recruited interns from across the country. While Scales was there, FOX employed over 40 interns, each doing different jobs throughout the company.

Scales, a Communications major and Journalism and Mass Communication minor, became involved with the program when FOX Senior Vice President Tom Tyrer came to speak in one of his classes last year. After class, Scales struck up a conversation with Tyrer, who eventually invited Scales to go out to Los Angeles for the internship.

Scales’ only journalistic experience before the internship was in radio at stations in Ottumwa. Scales worked at 97.7 KOTM for seven months as a sophomore in high school and later worked at 1240 KBIZ while he was attending Indian Hills Community College.

But Scales’ career aspirations stretch far past radio. He would like to get involved with film and get some small acting roles. He would like to write television scripts. In fact, he’s already working on an idea. His biggest goal is to start a record company, which would give opportunities to people from Iowa and other places that are not normally known for popular music scenes.

After he graduates in December, Scales plans to return to Los Angeles. He hopes to again work for “The Best Damn Sports Show Period,” which was his favorite show to work for.

“It was constant fun,” Scales said. “It didn’t even feel like going to work, that’s how fun it was. Sometimes I had to stop and think that this was my job.”

Scales said it is important to take chances when looking for employment. Scales didn’t know anyone in L.A., and his family urged him to find something closer to home, but Scales had dreamed of going to Los Angeles since the eighth grade and knew he had to go.

“It’s a tough thing to tell someone from Iowa to go out to Los Angeles when you don’t know anyone and get started on a career,” Scales said. “I really didn’t let anything stop me, and I think Tom Tyrer saw that as a positive attribute. That’s a huge step to take, and if you’re willing to take it, I think the payoffs are worth it.”

—Travis Brown

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Swedish student rocks for fair trade

Johan Bergenas, a University of Iowa junior from Vaxjo, Sweden, has spent the fall 2004 semester in Washington, D.C., interning for Oxfam-America, an organization that promotes fair trade and seeks long-term solutions to global poverty.

“I hope to increase awareness of Oxfam’s work on the domestic level,” Bergenas said.

During his time with Oxfam-America, Bergenas has been researching colleges across the United States with the hope that professors will be interested in using reports on fair trade in their curriculum.

“We want students to join in efforts to make trade fair,” Bergenas said. “The reports show students how trade in large companies affects small countries.”

He has also promoted Oxfam’s message in the Washington, D.C., area. At a concert by rock group R.E.M., he handed out information about free trade.

Bergenas also said that being in Washington during the 2004 presidential election was an incredible opportunity.

“These elections are the most important in my lifetime,” he said. “But just because I couldn’t vote doesn’t mean I’m not a part of the political process.”

Bergenas said that during his coursework at the UI he covered the caucuses as part of a presidential election class Web site.

“I don’t see myself as an observer [in the election],” he said, adding that he did last-minute campaigning the night before the election.

Bergenas said he is interested in diplomacy and hopes to pursue a career as a foreign correspondent. But staying in the United States is a possibility as well.

“The United States isn’t better or worse [than Sweden], it’s just different,” he said.

—Carrie Napolilli

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Night and day, Moore promotes Memoirs

Phoning major literary editors by day and attending book promotions in London’s trendy SoHo district by night, Chadwick Moore said he looks forward to going to work each day.

Moore, a senior from Champaign, Ill., spent the fall 2004 semester interning at Black Spring Press in London, England.

“My internship at Black Spring is where I have tried to put much of my efforts and energy since I have been in London,” Moore said. “And it will be one of the things I miss most.”

With only two full time employees and two interns, the small paperback publishing company allowed Moore to gain hands-on experience while working in a “pretty casual and intimate work environment.”

Moore learned about the internship from a close friend who spent last year interning at Black Spring, through an American University program.

Black Spring’s latest publication is Julian Maclaren-Ross Collected Memoirs, the complete memoirs of writer and actor Maclaren-Ross, whom Moore describes as a “wartime SoHo dandy whose friends and admirers included Graham Greene, Evelyn Waugh and Dylan Thomas.”

To promote the book, many readings and events regarding Maclaren-Ross’s work have been scheduled in the SoHo area, Maclaren-Ross’s former stomping grounds.

“A lot of my work outside of the office is attending these events,” Moore said. “Not only because of my own personal love for and interest in Maclaren-Ross’s work, but also to help promote Collected Memoirs, to sell books and represent the company.”

Many of the events were organized by the Soheimian Society, a group dedicated to learning about and promoting their love for Boheimian Soho.

Moore also attended the book’s release party on Dec. 5, held at the Wheatsheaf Pub in SoHo, “Maclaren-Ross’s most notorious hangout in the 40s, 50s and 60s.”

Inside the office, Moore has worked to promote the book by contacting major newspapers and magazines throughout London and the UK that have received copies of Collected Memoirs from Black Spring.

Moore phoned literary editors “who don’t have time to speak with [him] and can’t remember receiving [the book] in the mail.” He urged them to read and review the book, a process that often required several weeks of persistent phone calls before he was given a straight answer.

“This part of my job isn’t nearly as fruitless as it may sound,” Moore said. “[Major media outlets such as] The Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement, The Daily Telegraph and Outfoxed Magazine have all committed to doing a review, which is wonderful news.”

Upon graduation, Moore hopes to obtain an entry-level position in publishing, doing work similar to what he has done at Black Spring.

—Carrie Napolilli

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Zotaley to head two J-MC programs

Krisanthy Zotaley, a senior from Minneapolis, Minn., was in a grave situation.

After spending the spring 2004 abroad, she had difficulty finding a summer internship in May. But luckily, through a family friend, she was hired at Bluefire Partners in Minneapolis. At Bluefire she, among other duties, wrote profile articles for the Minnesota Association of Cemeteries’ The MAC Quarterly.

“It was a really good experience for me,” Zotaley said. “Our firm was in charge of putting together that newsletter for them.”

Zotaley, a journalism and communication studies double major, is pursuing in a career in public relations, but Bluefire Partners was more focused on investor relations.

Zotaley was an assistant to Julia Nelson, the public relations executive. Nelson and Zotaley did all public relations work that wasn’t investment related, including product launches, special events, contacting media to get publicity and writing news releases.

Zotaley was able to take a larger role at Bluefire than if she was at a bigger firm. She said she learned a lot.

“It was a small firm and people were really willing to help me and get me involved with different parts of the firm,” she said. “It really introduced me to different parts of public relations.”

Since the beginning of the fall 2004 semester, Zotaley has interned for the University of Iowa School of Journalism and Mass Communication, as the assistant internship coordinator. She has been building an internship database, designing flyers about happenings in the journalism school and next semester she will head two programs.

The first program is a PR mentor program, in which upperclassmen in the journalism school will mentor students in lower-level classes. The second is a program, which will give newly admitted majors the opportunity to get clips.

Upon graduation in May, Zotaley plans to return to Minneapolis, where her goal is to get an internship with a large national or international public relations agency.

Zotaley said an internship is the only way to get a spot with a large firm directly out of college. After a six-month internship, then the firm decides if they want to hire, release or extend the internship.

Zotaley said it is important that students get started in school if they want a career in public relations. She suggested that students join Public Relations Student Society of America, which will give students accreditation, since most firms are part of PRSA.

“The most important thing in public relations is experience,” Zotaley said. “Employers aren’t going to ask you about your GPA, they’ll want to see your portfolio.”

—Travis Brown