“…coming from all over the country to protest the DNC and show the world that there are people in this country that are resolutely opposed to an attack on iran, furthering the wars in afghanistan and iraq for even one more day, the looming threat of American theocracy and in short the whole program begun by Bush.”

WORD Special Correspondent Jonathan Mena says he will be checking out Lu Chun-Chao’s reminder. Chun-Chao also wrote: “I’m helping organize the protests from NYC; I do know some people who would love to be interviewed by your paper, some who are organizing the protests on a national level and some who are going themselves. I don’t know right now of any Hunter students going”

Chun-Chao said that Cindy Sheehan; Vietnam war vet and author Ron Kovic; Debra Sweet, director of World Can’t Wait, revolutionary activist and journalist Sunsara Taylor; Militiary Mother Elaine Brower and author Larry Everest will be there. Contact information for interviews: Linda Rigas - 714.235.8213 or Debra Sweet 718.809.3803.

“NEWz’s Eduardo de Oliveira heads off to Denver soon — thanks to New America Media (NAM) — to cover the Democratic National Convention, Aug. 25-28, 2008. Eduardo and nine* other NAM-sponsored ethnic-media journalists will blog and report on the DNC for electorates of color, all across the USA. “For the first time, Latinos and immigrants in general can [have] a bigger role in selecting the next president of the United States,” he says, much bigger than in previous US presidential elections during their lifetime.” More to read here.

[*Editor's Note: Because of deadlines and distances and exigencies and matters too numerous to list here, the WORD's three special correspondents — Kisha Allison, Jacqueline Fernandez and Jonathan Mena — were not mentioned in Oliveira's article. Instead, the two overseers for the correspondents' passes were listed, Gregg Morris and National NAM Editor Anthony D. Advincula.]

— From Jonathan Mena:

The Presidential race for the White House has become the most watched and anticipated election in the world.

All eyes will be on America come this November as recent polls show that the race will be a neck-and-neck battle. This election will be history in the making and the WORD will be there to report thanks in large part to New America Media, NAM, a national collaboration and advocate for over 2000 ethnic news organizations, The Ford Foundation, which provided a grant for a multimedia ethnic reporting project that includes the WORD and of course Professor Gregg Morris who is a master at knowing what buttons to push to get a job done.

We, the three correspondents from the WORD, will be traveling to Denver in less than a week to cover one of the biggest events in political history. Kisha Allison, a veteran of the political circus that was the primaries. and Jacqueline Fernandez, already a professional journalist in her own right and, myself the “technical support” will make our journey at the end of this week to Denver.

Don’t expect news coverage like what your used to from CNN and FOX. We will provide you the stories not being covered by the majors and will be doing it in words, pictures and video. In the weeks before the big show in Denver, we have been hard at work interviewing delegates that will be attending the DNC so you need to stay tuned as we will be bring you the footage in the week to come.

Thanks in large part to the genius who invented wireless data cards we will be updating pictures and video so frequently that you will think you are watching a movie as we cover events around Denver. We will also be bringing you for the first time in WORD history LIVE video coverage of the DNC viewable on out own blogtv channel www.blogtv.com/People/THEHUNTERWORD.

This video blog is not a test [like the earlier one]!

Your main source for getting in the know about what we will be doing in Denver is the www.hunterword.com; please check the for our daily blog entries, video and pictures posting.

You will see us in Denver!

[Editor's Note: I've been a little slow setting up accounts on this blog for the three special correspondents to the convention. So we are using this makeshift arrangement of me posting their posts until we square things away at a meeting tonight]

Jonathan Vlog - Broadcast your self LIVE

 … it looks like I will have a very busy year. Right now the first class is a three-weeks intensive reporting training class and while my reporting professor was describing the class I couldn’t help but remember the hardest class I took at Hunter: Advanced Reporting!“

For the benefit of students considering journalism careers at Hunter College, I’m posting this email from one of my former students. She continues about her first class at Columbia:

The first words coming out of my professor’s mouth were: Take good notes, go to community board meetings, talk to neighborhood representatives, write down all the information on sources, etcetera. You should tell your students who are interested in careers in journalism to take your basic and advanced reporting classes. They are, I think, the two only classes that try to prepare students to be journalists.

Advanced reporting was a real challenge but I just realized that it gave me the tools to work in a professional environment. The J-School at Columbia works like a newsroom and its masters degree is a professional degree rather than an academic one.

So, Hunter students serious about journalism and media internships and careers should consider Advanced Reporting, Media 293, until something better comes along [but they shouldn't hold their breaths].