November 19, 2019 – Total Croatia News is delighted to announce an internship programme with the Faculty of Political Science & Journalism of the University of Zagreb. Meet the TCN interns!
The TCN inbox is never dull, and with our policy of flexibility and going with the flow, the inbox often leads us into some unplanned and very unchartered waters.
A few weeks ago, I received an invitation from Professor Gaj Tomas from the University of Zagreb to give a lecture to his second-year journalism students about the realities of running a news portal in Croatia today. It was not something I had ever planned to do, but I appreciated the invitation and interest, and the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. Some kind of partnership with the university would make sense, and perhaps we could even organise a programme for some TCN interns.
Many thanks to Luka Solta for filming the lecture (for any interested students who could not make the very early 9 am start) can see the lecture in full in the two YouTube videos below. At the end, I discussed the internship concept and invited any interested students to contact me if they were interested. It had been an interesting experience for me, and I headed off to Hvar to help pick the family olives without really expecting to hear from any of the students again.
But then I did, the next day. One of the students who attended wrote a very sweet email of thanks and registering interest in the programme. And then another. And then another. Three TCN interns! Now I would have to come up with a concrete programme for them…
I met with Janja, Paula and Ana recently in a Zagreb cafe to get to know their interests and what they wanted to get out of the internship. For my part, one of the benefits of the internship for TCN is that it brings us closer to the Gen Z generation and allows us to explore different forms of media. I am grateful to PR guru Kresimir Macan who has agreed to lend his expertise to the internship programme for our political student, as well as very favourable feedback from a number of Croatian businesses where I think our internship initiative can bring mutual benefit.
Our TCN interns will be doing a variety of tasks with TCN mentoring, including writing their own standalone articles, making short videos around Zagreb, and doing various research projects. We will publish the first of their articles tomorrow. If your business is interested in supporting our intern initiative, please contact me on [email protected] and we can see how the relationship can develop.
In the meantime, meet the new TCN interns, in their own words. A little about them, why they are studying journalism, and what they hope to get from the programme.
Meet the TCN Interns: Janja Šestak
Hello there, my name is Janja Šestak and I am from a small village named Seketin (near a former capital city of Croatia, can you guess? But no pressure).
My hobbies include archery (I hold several state records), reenactments (more or less), singing (not saying I’m good, I just love to sing) and soon playing the guitar (God, help my roommates). I love to hike, being in nature, going around castles and fortresses (ex wanna-be-knight, who would say). I love sport and I love to think I’m good at it. Also, I was part of the movie and the professional theatre play (HNK Varaždin) and in both held the main role, nothing special. I love to write and I think I am creative, sometimes. Oh yes, I love eating. Seriously, I love food.
Why I have chosen journalism? Well, at first, I was interested in criminalistics because I naively think I can rid Croatia of the bribery and corruption disease which is spreading. Not only that, but there is also more of this, of course. After that, I was thinking about being a military pilot because I don’t plan to have a boring life. Here I am now, a student of journalism who is going to bed around 10 p.m. on Saturday.
However, I still think I can fix a part of Croatia. Even a small one, it doesn’t matter. I would love to be the reason that someone is smiling again. I would love to be someone who encourages others to do great things. I am a huge fan of what the team Provjereno is doing, but I don’t want to be next Ivana Paradžiković, I want to be the first Janja Šestak.
My biggest flaw: hastiness. My biggest advantage: adaptability. Now something that is a flaw and an advantage in one, I try to see good in every situation and person. I like to think every person has something good in her. In general, my problem is I’m interested in a lot of things which is hard sometimes because I really don’t know how to compress all of them in one and called it a job one day.
Lastly, I don’t take things for granted. I give my best for things or people that matter to me. All in. Yeah, that kind of would be my motto. If you’re doing things superficially or by force, seriously, don’t do it.
Link of a trailer of the theatre play.
Meet the TCN Interns: Paula Anić
My name is Paula Anić and I’m a 2nd-year student of journalism at the Faculty of Political Science in Zagreb. I am 20 years old and live with my parents and sister in Zagreb, the capital city of Croatia.
Ever since I can remember I have been interested in writing. At first, those were short stories that I would read only to my younger sister because I was afraid to show them to anyone else. With years, my passion for writing grew, and with it came the passion for history. That in particular, I can thank my high school professor, an amazing woman who made me fall in love with history by talking about it with an immense passion. Once I entered the magical world of kings, queens, battles, and wars I also started reading a lot. During my high school days, I become known as a girl that always has a book in her arms and that hasn’t changed till today. No matter how many people are there in a tram or a bus, I can always be seen reading some of my favorite novels.
A little while later, I started being interested in politics and that is my biggest passion at the moment. Next year’s goals include enrolling in Faculty for political science and studying it together with journalism. Some of the long term goals include perhaps one day working in diplomacy/foreign relations or being a member of the European Parliament.
That is where I come to explain why I want to work with TCN. For once, it is an unbiased news portal that gives its journalists great freedom in writing about topics of their own choice and it is based on promoting positive news rather than filling its readers with negative ones all the time. It sounds like a dream come true for anyone who wants to do this job. The other thing is the fact that my college focuses mainly on building our theoretical knowledge and very little on practical training which I think is crucial for every aspiring journalist. I see great potential for growth as a writer, especially in English by working with Paul and TCN.
Some of my other, still developing skills and hobbies include learning about film theory and learning French, both of which I have started doing during this academic year and have fallen in love with. In my free time, that is while I’m not reading some new and exciting book, I am volunteering in two organizations; AIESEC which focuses on building relations with foreign countries (my job includes explaining people from Croatia what kind of benefit they can get from volunteering all across the globe) and eStudent where I am part of PR and Event Management team. I only just started the later, but I am were excited and eager to learn all about it and work on promising new projects regarding students. I see myself as a capable and positively stubborn person who, once it starts something, doesn’t stop until the job is done.
Meet the TCN Interns: Ana Samodol
My name is Ana Samodol, I come from Šibenik and I am a second-year student of journalisam at the Faculty of Political Science. What I see as passion in my future job is investigating interesting and less common stories about people, what kind of life they have and if they unfortunately had any obstacles in their lives. Also I like reading about travelling, mainly where to travel, what to see, what monuments can be visited, and what can you do in that town. Furthermore I like reading about other cultures, their foods, drinks and their customs. I am very fascinated by Turkish food and their culture, mostly by their beautiful towns, monuments and natural sights.
I also like reading lifestyle articles, sometimes even sports and the most important news from politics and business. Sometimes that type of news might seem a bit boring, but I have to keep up with things that are happening in Croatia and all over the world. I like to share reading interests with students my age. These are the reasons why I would write about things to do in Zagreb or Croatia, where to hang out with your friends, how to study and enjoy in student life. As I said over the coffee, I love watching TV shows and films. My favourite TV shows are sitcoms, I love watching them because they make me feel better and I forget about my problems. I also love listening to older hits from previous century; 80s, 70s, 90s and 2000 music. In my opinion, music from that era was far better than this one today. Unfortunately I can’t listen to this type of music on Radio Student where I volunteer, where I write and read the news.
I want to be a journalist because I am interested in radio and television journalisam. Apart from those things I would also like to write about interesting stories of people, travelling and culture of other countries. I applied for an internship at Total Croatia News because I want to expand my knowledge in journalism and collect knowledge and ideas from other journalists. Also I would like to learn more about Croatian culture in which I am not familiar with. Apart from expanding my knowledge in journalism, I want to improve my personal, communicating and writing skills.
Thank you, Ladies, we look forward to working with you.
