Teen wants to be a sports journalist – ideas to help (without it feeling like “school”)?

[Snowbolt]

My nephew (Year 10) is focused on becoming a sports journalist, which is great and lovely that he’s got a clear idea of what he’d like to do. The challenge is he doesn’t really read much (if at all), and he’s not exactly open to advice or help. When you try to have a chat, it’s mostly “don’t know” territory (not always in a surly way; he doesn’t seem to think for the answer to the most basic of questions). Doing ok at school - in top sets, but general knowledge is shocking. The school is pretty useless.

I wouldn’t say his vocabulary is the strongest right now, and obviously that’s pretty key for journalism, so we’re wondering how to gently broaden things for him, but without it feeling like tutoring or schoolwork.

Are there things like debating clubs, creative writing groups, or other activities that might help build those skills in a more engaging way?

I know he’ll roll his eyes at most suggestions, but as he’s so set on this career idea (and probably doesn’t realise yet what the job really involves), we’d like to give him the best possible steer without putting him off completely.

Hello, unfortunately this is an extremely competitive area with fewer and fewer jobs due to AI and the internet generally. I’d encourage him to try and get work experience at his local paper/website/radio station. I did a post-graduate diploma in journalism at City University in London and that course (along with the Cardiff one) was brilliant at encouraging us to make contacts, network, get work experience. You can’t force him to read but it would help. Good luck to him!

He is going to massively struggle here without contacts . Generally our reporters come to us after a degree , freelancing a few years and having an independent media presence eg website , blogging etc .

AI is moving so fast I don't think there will be many paid positions in 5 years time frankly.

Which sports is he interested in he needs to make contacts there and show up for matches .Would he look at PR or club press offices - there is likely to be more opportunities if he can be more commercially minded .

Which sport is he most interested in? I'd say sports journalism course them uni with lots of blogs/vlogs for his portfolio

I went to a subject talk at Northampton University on sports journalism when my dd was looking around there. There was a bit about podcasts and of course radio. A lot of journalism isn’t writing I suppose. Maybe going to an open day somewhere where they do sports journalism near you might help because if they tell him what he can do now to prepare then he might listen!

There is a great app called Elevate that’s good for improving vocabulary. It’s £20 though.

More than 50% of sport articles are already written by AI and for soccer matches we are close to 100%.
To encourage him, ask him report on a sport event to you or to the local FB page or hyperlocal newspaper, even a digital one.
If he is spending time with you, buy a paper newspaper on those days and have him read an article to you whilst you are cooking and then debate about it.
You could also encourage him to start a sport blog.

You’ve had some quite frankly brilliant advice already.

I was just going to suggest he looks at how many graduates there are each year for Sports Journalism and how many vacancies there are. It’s not impossible but he really does need to start getting articles published as soon as he can and making his network.

The amount of vacancies available now is dire and as Hold says, by the time he has done his A’Levels and a degree it’s likely that there will be no paid positions left.

One thing you could ask him is that if he was lucky enough to get a job, and these are usually poorly paid, how would he feel about relocating?

Is his current thinking along the lines of 'I love watching sport so I'll have a job where I get paid to watch and write about it'?

as others have said, he needs to create his own on line presence whether that's blogging, tick toks or doing reels where he talks about what he thinks. He could start by doing some pieces on local amateur teams or going to a match/fixture/game and talking about it or even live blog something showing on tv

is there any particular sport/sports he likes?

but yes competition in this area is huge!

Agree with this, volunteer at hospital or community radio stations, find out who does compering at community events like local fairs or sports fixtures and offer to help, look for work placements at local newspaper (now often online rather than printed editions) . Activities like debating groups, entering writing competitions, starting a blog. Many journalists do other media related roles while developing their skills until an opportunity comes along. Perhaps look at uni journalism courses and work backwards.

Yes great advice already and I would like to add my voice.

This is what he needs to and can do:

• Get some words out there – start a blog about the sport or sport he loves
• Go to a local club and ask to be their comms person
• Write reviews, interviews thought pieces about the club and send to the local paper – take pictures and send them too, plus video clips if possible
• Try for work exp at a local paper or radio station (less likely tbh)
• Write, write! Get going on socials – images, clips, commentary, anything – Insta, TikTok, even FB

A social media presence is important and SM is probably where much of the work will be going forward. All media roles are so competitive so he needs every advantage.

No one is going to offer him a job based on nothing. They will want to see the above. It’s so easy to get your words out there now (as opposed to when I was a would-be reporter) thanks to blogs and social media. He needs to be very proactive. The best way to learn this job is to do it and see what you produce. Much better than schoolish learning of vocab. Also look at what the newspaper does with your copy and learn from that. When I was a junior I would go an nag the subs about why they had changed this sentence or that one.

I am the comms officer for a local club for a sport I love and I would absolutely snatch his hand off if he said he could support me with interviews and match reports as I really don’t have the time and am not often there to take photos or do videos. So if he was handy with a phone camera and could provide that as well, fab.

The main main thing is he needs to DO IT – no one is going to offer him this he needs to really get out there and NOW is the time

(I post a lot on these boards with my MFL teacher hat on btw but I am also a former newspaper and mag journalist and still work in the creative industry as well as teaching – so I do have some knowledge whereof I speak)

See if local sports teams have a newsletter he can be involved with or want help managing their social.media pages.

Parkrun have run report as a volunteer role so he could do a few of those and local parkrun may also have a Facebook page he could offer help with

Surely he needs to try and get some work experience in this area?!?

Much better and much easier to do some writing - both to show his work and to see if he likes it.

Not many media outlets are keen to give work exp to a 14-15yo IME. Tho hospital radio may be a shout. But he needs to be super proactive.

Does he have a favourite sport? Does he have a favourite reporter or commentator? Is he a mine of information about the teams, the players, the competition cycle? How is he on the rules? A breadth of knowledge and opinion would be an advantage, I'd expect, as an adjunct to using AI.

Sounds like he likes the idea of it but isn't prepared to do the work for it. Explain he's going to need experience as well as the academic qualifications. Direct him but if he can't be bothered to engage, then he'll learn the hard way. He could try and connect with a local journalist for work shadowing/experience and that might open his eyes to what's expected.

As someone who’s in a similar industry, I’d be encouraging him to rethink. Pretty sure AI is going to take my job in the next few years, and it’ll only be the most talented few who can still get paid work going forward.

My friends son is Sports Journo, it was a long and hard path though and luckily his parents are wealthy and could support him. Some things he did
A Levels in English Lang and Sports Science
Playing football at a regional level from an early age
Being involved in local clubs as a volunteer steward
Doing Journalism at Uni
Getting knows for Uni radio and pocasts, blogs, video etc
After all that he finally has a paid job BUT his parents still subsidise him

My ds is a journalist on mainstream media.

He did the MA at Sheffield uni. It’s one of the 3 courses accredited by the NUJ

He was clueless at y10.

He used his last year in university ( not a redbrick) as an undergrad to build up a student news sheet into something really big.

The course has loads of contacts. He worked for Sky, The Huffington Post, Press Association and others.

Its the university that counts.

I agree with the above. Start getting experience now. Become an expert in certain sports.

Has he any idea of what sports he wants to report on?

Also, start following sports journalists on ibstragram, such as Mike Wills.

Also when he says sports journalist, what does he mean? Does he want to commentate, write for a local or national newspaper, write for a magazine, produce social media posts, write for a website? Some of those roles are disappearing fast.

If he goes to uni, there will be opportunities to do the socials for uni sport. Get him to look at a few. Loughborough is great, as is Brum. Northern Athletics (my sport) does some great media work too. All the people doing this are volunteers btw.

I know a TV sports journalist. He went to local state schools then university and started out in local radio before moving into TV. Our local radio station is often looking out for unpaid volunteers. It's a good way to see if it's for you and to develop your skills and your CV.

The journalist I know is well-paid now, but it's harder work than it looks. He spends most of his time researching, travelling and setting up interviews. Then he spends ages recording and editing his news reports - he's a real perfectionist. To watch him present a brief sports report on the local news, you might think he had plenty of free time, but he actually works long hours.

I think you can do your best to present the opportunities to him but you may find that this idea will fade when he realises how unequipped he is (particularly if he is not prepared to skill up). I have found that some kids have these ideas of what their vocation looks like without the necessary insight into what it would require to actually be that in real life (its a bit of Dunning Kruger affect). On the plus side though, he is still young so this kind of impractical thinking is perfectly normal.

BBC, Tortoise Media and others do media work experience for youth and later, apprenticeship. Could have a look at what's out there?

A lad we know volunteered at the local non-league football club at 14 (off his own initiative - he just contacted them and offered to help on match days). They gave him a job of recording scores, corners etc. and while he was there, he got bored and started writing his own articles about the games. By 16 he was paid to be their official match reporter every week.
I’m sure there are local grass roots and non-league/sunday league sports clubs that would welcome match reports, maybe even occasional player interviews for their websites etc. This level of sport relies on volunteers and is unlikely to adopt the high tech AI solutions themselves. It does require a bit of initiative, but also learning how to report on sports using AI tools would equip him for the future.

Jobs that are at risk of being replaced by AI still need people who know how to use those AI tools and get the best out them.

Have him start a blog now, not to get an audience or anything, but to develop his writing skills. Then have him compare his writing to the writing of a professional and make some edits.