Compass contest for aspiring journalists

The Caymanian Compass is offering students interested in a career in journalism the opportunity to join the newspaper’s editorial team for a day.  

The Be a Journalist competition, which was launched on Monday, 19 September, is being run to select two promising news reporters from among the student population ages 13-17.  

The winning students will have the opportunity to see first-hand how a newspaper works, focusing on the journalism aspect of the business.  

“The winners of this contest will have a unique opportunity to spend a day here at the Caymanian Compass and really see what it takes to produce a daily newspaper, plus our many other publications,” said Tammie C. Chisholm, editor.  

The students will gain an insight into the skills needed to write news stories, meet deadlines and more.  

During their day at the Caymanian Compass they will also have the opportunity to create a video report and read a news bulletin for the radio.  

In addition to spending time with photojournalists, the winners will also gain an understanding of the different roles and job opportunities that exist within a publishing company, from sales to design, photography and administration.  

‘Home-grown’ journalists 

“We want to nurture and encourage ‘home-grown’ journalists as much as possible, and to do this we are reaching out to them while they are still in school. Hopefully, if we can inspire them to pursue a career in journalism they will go off and study this and one day return to work with us,” Mrs. Chisholm said.  

“If anyone thinks they would like a career working for the largest publishing company in the Cayman Islands, this is an ideal way of seeing if it might be something you’d like to do,” she added. 

In order to enter the competition, students are asked to either write a short news story or create a video of them reporting a news story.  

The subject matter can be anything that they consider to be topical and newsworthy.  

Full terms and conditions of the competition will be published in the Caymanian Compass, the Observer on Sunday and online at www.caycompass.com The competition will run until midnight, 23 October. The winners will be announced on Monday, 24 October.