I spent nearly 14 years of my life playing softball. The game took me
all over the country and earned me a scholarship for college.
My place of solitude has always been on the field. Taylor Turner | NYT Institute
But suddenly, like a bad pitch that slams into you in the batter’s
box, I was taken out of the game by two successive back surgeries to
remove tumors on my spine. After that, each time I stepped up to the
plate, the decision was no longer whether I should bunt or hit, but
whether I would walk in the future.
Suddenly, I found myself on the sidelines of the game I love. I
became softball’s biggest fan in the stands and began looking for ways
to combine my love for the game with my aspirations to be a video
journalist.
Jennie Finch, famed softball player, made an appearance at the NCAA Softball Super Regionals in Lafayette, La.Taylor Turner | NYT Institute
This month, I helped cover the women’s college softball Super
Regional series between the University of Louisiana-Lafayette and the
University of Arizona. It was my first opportunity to combine my two
crafts. I was faced with many challenges as a videographer attempting to
catch the game from a fan’s perspective. Video rights, technical
challenges, thirsty mosquitoes — plus an unexpected sighting of the
famed softball player Jennie Finch — kept me occupied during the
tournament.
The best part of this experience was the ability to hit a home run to
any pitch that life throws you. I walked away from the tournament with a
vision for a career in sports journalism. A career that will make
waking up in the morning that much easier and enjoyable for the rest of
my life. A career and not just a job.
The University of Louisiana players have unusual superstitions that
extend to their fan base and parents. The Ragin’ Cajuns’ superstitions
include stuffed frogs, no-lens glasses and holey batting gloves.
Just as a picture is worth a thousand words, Evan Ortiz cannot be described in one.
“I am just as quiet and observant as I am engaged, outgoing, funny
and insane,” said Mr. Ortiz, a 21-year-old photographer from Brooklyn,
N.Y. “I am all over the place, but I love it. I love being able to
interact with people, be a part of their lives and also see, observe and
learn.”
Mr. Ortiz discovered his passion for fashion photography while
studying photojournalism as an undergraduate at the Rochester Institute
of Technology.
“I realized there was an opportunity to really get to know people
through photography,” he said. “I just love what the camera can do to
visually show and represent a person in their life and what their life
means to them.”
Evan Ortiz, 21, in
New Orleans on Monday is a photographer from Brooklyn. He said, “I am
just as quiet and observant as I am engaged, outgoing, funny and
insane.”Photo by Donnalyn Anthony | NYT Institute
Mr. Ortiz first heard about the two-week New York Times Student
Journalism Institute from a professor who encouraged him to look into
the program. After doing a bit of research, he was eager to apply.
“I have had some journalism experience, but I want to push and expand on my knowledge,” he said.
Mr. Ortiz hopes that the institute will teach him how to work under
deadlines, enrich his storytelling abilities and develop the practical
and technical skills needed to execute his stories.
“I have done a lot of photography work and video journalism, but I
also want to see if I can harness more skills specifically related to
journalism,” he said.
Mr. Ortiz said that he was excited and amazed by the group of
students in the Institute and he hopes to build a community with his
peers and produce a body of work that will make them proud.
“The collaborative aspect will be a good and healthy challenge for
me, but it is something I am really proud to be a part of,” he said.
When Nicholas Tolliver graduated from high school, he skipped college and headed straight for the chemical plant.
Like many other Louisiana students who are looking to make big money
in a short time, Mr. Tolliver, who is 27 and from New Roads, sought out
employment in the oil and gas industry instead of enrolling at a college
or university.
In 2005, Mr. Tolliver enrolled at a community college in Baton Rouge
to take business classes. But after a conversation with a neighbor who
said he could earn as much as $100,000 a year as an oil or gas
technician, he transferred to a certification program to receive
training for the industry.
“What sold me was the pay,” Mr. Tolliver said. “There are not too many places that you make that much that young.”
Louisiana is a region with a high demand for workers who can weld and work on oil rigs that are scattered along the Gulf Coast. Oil- and gas-related occupations
are expected to grow as much as 22 percent by 2022, according to data
from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, many of which require only a basic
level of education and work experience or on-the-job training. New
Orleans has seen growth in the demand for welders because of the
continuing effort to rebuild the city after Hurricane Katrina, and
because of new projects like a hospital corridor in downtown New
Orleans.
The new construction has proved appealing for high school graduates
who are interested in transitioning into high-paying jobs without a
four-year college degree. Many of them are employed by the oil and
petrochemical industries, which includes working at refineries and
chemical plants, where jobs are plentiful and higher paying.
“Louisiana is in the midst of a huge economic and workforce
development boom,” said Quintin Taylor, the executive director of media
at the Louisiana Community and Technical College System. “Companies are
expanding or relocating to Louisiana for a number of different reasons,
primarily because oil is a big business.”
The State Education Department reports that just 28 percent of
Louisiana’s high school students continue their education after
graduation. To improve those numbers, the Louisiana educational system
has implemented programs that train students for careers in the
technical and industrial fields.
The city has also supported education initiatives and certification
programs for students who are interested in entering various industries
that require an understanding of industrial or process technology, such
as oil, gas, food production and chemical plants. Many of them allow
students to take classes and receive their industry certificates
simultaneously.
“Simply put, too few young adults in Louisiana have the skills and
credentials to assume the high-wage jobs offered in today’s Louisiana
economy,” said Barry Landry, a spokesman for the Louisiana Department of
Education.
Mr. Landry pointed to a program called Jump Start, which allows
students to take technical classes alongside their regular high school
curriculum so that they graduate with degrees, ready to apply to jobs in
demand for their region. Mr. Landry said it is the state’s new program
for “school districts, colleges and businesses to collaborate in
providing career courses and workplace experiences to high school
students, allowing them to continue their education after high school, certifying them for the career fields most likely to lead to high-wage jobs.”
The lucrative career opportunities are also appealing to people whose professional pursuits do not pan out.
Students at Nunez Community College are able to earn a certification in welding and are exposed to multiple job opportunities.Taylor Turner | NYT Institute
“We are getting a number of students that already have their
four-year degree,” said Thomas R. Warner, the chancellor of Nunez
Community College, which offers industrial technical training. He said
the school’s enrollment is increasing due to its certification programs.
“They know the jobs are out there and they are graduating in other
areas that are great,” he said, “but the jobs are not as promised as
they are right now in process technology and welding.”
Not all students who graduate from technical schools are guaranteed
employment after graduation and for some of them, it does not become the
lifelong career they may have envisioned.
Le’Ambra Alfred, 22, received a certificate in process technology in
2011, having trained to become an oil rig operator. Not long after, he
obtained a job at a major oil company in Louisiana. The money was good,
but the hours were long.
“Those are the negatives to the job,” he said. “It also takes a while to move up and you have to know someone.”
Mr. Alfred said he always worried about the long-term security of his
job. The technical programs offer a “good degree if you plan on living
in Louisiana or in the oil states for the rest of your life, but if you
want to move to other areas, it may not be,” he said.
Mr. Alfred is now pursuing a career in medicine at Grambling State University.
Michael Whetstone, an offshore field supervisor, has been in the
industry for more than 40 years. He believes it can sustain students
over the course of long and fruitful careers.
“This industry isn’t built for everyone, everyone can’t do this work,
but you never really get laid off,” he said. “If something slows down
in one sector, you can move and do something else. There is a lot of
diversity.”
The United States Postal Service is implementing
cost cutting measures while on the verge of running out of money.
Due to budget cuts, the South Texas town of Cedar Lake,
population 683, could soon lose its post office. Every year, Cedar Lake
resident Bobbie Johnson estimates about 20,000 pieces of mail are routed
through the small towns mailing office. According to data presented by the U.S.
Postal Service, some 3,700 small town post offices made the list of those that
could potentially be closed as the U.S. Postal Service tightens its reigns. Johnson
says if the post office in her small town closes, the nearest branch would be
more than 35 miles away. According to a U.S. Postal Service spokesman, these
closures and other cost cutting measures could save the federal government
money.
The possibility of a collapse of the U.S. Postal
Service has put the longtime service on the verge of default. The lead
Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe warned that without immediate assistance
from Congress, “the USPS could default on its payment and be out of money by
next year, forcing it to shut down all operations.”
The 238-year-old institution has recently been buckling
under the pressure of massive payments for future retiree benefits and
dwindling revenue as more Americans communicate by email. Last year,
the USPS reported $16 billion in revenue loss. The service is in need of rapid
and drastic restructuring to remain financially viable in the future.
The proposed USPS cuts
are big. Donahoe presented a number of measures that he argues would halt the USPS’s
rapid financial decline, including the elimination of the annual pre-fund
payment requirement, stopping Saturday mail delivery and terminating a
“no-layoff” clause in a contract with unionized postal workers.
According to Donahoe,
“cutting service down to five days a week instead of six, is a proposal that
has been kicked around for years, and would save about $3 billion a year.”
Donahoe has also urged Congress to
allow him to shut down standalone post offices, moving them into convenience
stores and supermarkets instead.
These proposals have
been met with resistance, not least by postal workers who stand to lose their
jobs but by USPS customers as well.
Johnson and other mail service customers are outraged at the
actions the USPS plan to take. “Congress
needs to leave Saturday delivery and the USPS alone,” Johnson said. “This is
just another way to force the post office to be doomed so that it can become
someone's private profit.”
Not all postal service
customers are in opposition to the proposed budget cuts.
Postal customer Brian
Fontenot said “the biggest problems the post office faces are obvious; they
refuse to adapt to the digital age which means less paper mail moving.”
Fontenot feels these
cost cutting measures and no mail delivery on Saturday would be great strides
towards modernization for the USPS.
Mail carrier Kiah
Williams is worried that the budget cuts will affect her employment.
“It is not about having
Saturday’s off,” Williams said, “but being able to make money; a change in the delivery
schedule could put me out of work.”
The USPS is not technically “broke” — yet. The USPS brings in profits
every year. The financial problem it faces now comes from a 2006 Congressional
mandate that requires the agency to pre-pay into a fund that covers health care
costs for future retired employees. Under the mandate, the USPS is required to
make an annual $5.5 billion payment over ten years, through 2016.
Revenue
has also been declining for years, and the postal service does not rely on taxpayer
funds. Until 1971, mail delivery was handled by the Post Office
Department, a Cabinet department in the federal government. Postal worker
strikes prompted President Nixon to pass the Postal Reorganization Act in 1971,
transforming it into the semi-independent agency we now know as the United
States Postal Service. The USPS has not used taxpayer money since 1982, when
postage stamps became products instead of forms of taxation. Taxpayer money is
only used in some cases to pay for mailing voter materials to disabled and
overseas Americans.
USPS spokespersons have been adamant in emphasizing that
they are not requesting taxpayer funds from the federal government to make this
year’s payment. Rather, they say, the USPS is asking Congress to authorize
access to an estimated $7 billion that they overpaid into the future retiree
pension fund in previous years.
“The
Postal Service is advancing an important new approach to delivery that reflects
the strong growth of our package business and responds to the financial
realities resulting from America’s changing mailing habits,” Donahoe said
in a statement. “We developed this approach by working with our customers to
understand their delivery needs and by identifying creative ways to generate
significant cost savings.”
The
USPS has been the topic of much debate over the past couple of years as it
reviews its options now that the digital world has seemingly rendered mail
service near-obsolete. Though widespread
email use has all but eliminated the need to send letters and many
people are going paperless in an effort to be green, a lot of people still rely
on the post office to deliver bills–especially those who don’t want to give out
their banking information online–and package delivery is always a concern.
In
an attempt to make things easier for its customers, the Postal Service has even introduced a new
service for packages recently that includes giving the customer the ability to
pay for and print their own shipping labels at home, then schedule a pick-up
using one of the service’s flat-rate boxes. But the agency says it will continue
to make packages a priority even as it prepares to end Saturday mail service,
scheduled to begin this summer.
