Colin Jackson speaks to The Voice

By Danny Oh
Staff Writer

Courtesy of Jackson

The Voice had the opportunity of joining Michigan Public Radio Network’s Colin Jackson for an online conversation around his career path, advice for beginner journalists, advice for political reporting, and more.

Colin Jackson is employed as a Statehouse reporter for MPR, where he covers pieces on education, politics, health, among other topics. Before that, he attended Michigan State University and acted as a radio producer for the Western Kentucky University Public Radio Station for several years.

During the event, Jackson spoke of his own nontraditional career path, and gave advice for finding and applying for news jobs, repeatedly emphasizing the importance of being prepared while remaining curious.

On his experience of applying to MPR, Jackson noted, “I did a bunch of research about the station before the interview. I remember I made myself a cheat sheet: Who’s the governor? Who’s the Secretary of State? What are the major issues of the day? … I think just those little things showed that I cared enough about the position that really set me apart.”

Afterwards, Jackson opened up the talk to a general Q&A. Jackson answered questions on misconceptions around reporting, writing, cold emailing, news consumption, and more.

On advice for writing, Jackson said, “Write how you talk. It’s really easy to get into this mindset of, ‘Oh, I need to sound a certain way to be professional.’ But everyone has a different way of figuring out how to find their own voice writing.”

“I’ve even seen people just walk around, talking to their phone, recording what they’re saying like they’re explaining the story to their friend. And then from there, editing that down into a story.”

On cold-emailing etiquette, Jackson recommended that in general to follow up multiple times, through email and phone calls, while remaining respectful.

During the Q&A, Jackson gave his general perspective on news reporting, saying, “At the end of the day, things are what they are–people are going to listen to their story, they’re going to learn something, or they don’t learn anything, or they don’t read it. Either way, you put something out there that’s important to the world.”