Letter to the Editor: When journalism and communications don’t line up

    (Caitlin Dutt/AQ)

    For some people, it’s very difficult to decide what they’re going to do for the rest of their life at such a young age. In countries like mine, only law, medicine and engineering are seen with good eyes. However, what I really wanted to do with my life was actually travel around the world and write about my experiences. So, I decided to study journalism.

    And I don’t even know if I regret it or not.

    Coming to St. Thomas University was an honour and writing for The Aquinian gives me a very clear idea of how the work of a journalist is like. But can I just say how difficult it is to actually write? When we start university, we know the probabilities of graduation happening and that job offers are very likely. We all focus to enrich our diplomas – and it’s no different for journalism students. To get internships and good jobs and maintain these jobs, we have to write. And write. And write. And it’s so difficult sometimes because we depend a lot on people to do our work. And, let’s be honest, depending on people sucks.

    Technology was created with the purpose of us communicating better with one another. But in fact, communication depends not on devices or apps, but on people. I took courses that taught the evolution of communication and how it evolved for the better of our society, and how it helps us to interact and socialize. And now I ask: does it really? I saw students writing for the newspaper constantly complaining about how they can’t reach people and communicate with anyone when they need to report. We text, we send e-mails, we make calls – we do everything we can to talk to someone so we can get information and spread this information to people, but these same people simply don’t give the damn information. How are we supposed to do our job this way?

    So, dear non-journalism-student friends: please communicate with us. Because we need our diplomas as well.

    Sincerely,

    Bruna Porto