Two Weeks

It's been two weeks since I started work here at the Inquirer. I'm working Tuesdays and Thursdays in the afternoon/evening, and they are certainly keeping me busy. I spend my time in the office condensing press releases, writing briefs and making calls. Meanwhile, I'm also busy writing two feature stories when I'm not helping the editors with smaller tasks.
I've been placed in the sports department, where I'm working with a few other interns to help develop the Inquirer's new high school sports website "Rally." Generally, we'll have one or two features a week that will be posted on the website or in the print edition. For the first stories, I pitched each of them to my editor Gary Miles, and every intern's story is an idea that I developed. The two specific stories I'm working on include: Long-time high school coaches in the area and fathers who coach sons/mothers who coach daughters in the area. I've narrowed down plenty of sources for each story. The difficult part is getting them to call me back. I've spent the past week making calls, leaving voicemails and sending emails to all of my sources. I've had very little luck. I'm hoping they come around soon so I can get to work on my next two features.
Overall, the experience has been exciting so far. I've had the opportunity to meet the entire sports editorial staff and a number of the reporters. I've had three by-lines in the paper already, and that number is only going to grow. I spent much of last week creating player profile capsuls for the entire Philadelphia Flyers team, which should run in Sunday's sports section.
While the commute is long, it is worth it. I look forward to getting into the office every Tuesday and Thursday. I hope the connections and experience I get in here will help me in the future.