As a new member of the Elgin Community College Observer, I was unaware of what I would be stepping into. School newspapers sounded like a blast. I had seen previous issues around ECC’s campus and thought it would be fun to take my turn at it. When my adviser, Professor Obradovich, informed that we would be going down to Eastern Illinois University for the Illinois Community College Journalism Association Conference, I was excited!

One, a free trip away from ECC? Heck yes. Two, a way to knock out a college trip and meet new people at the same time, I’m down with that.

On Oct. 5, I met Professor Obradovich and Managing Editor, Luz Silva, in the front of Building A to board upon the ECC van for our three-hour car ride down to Eastern Illinois University. Luz packed for what seemed as days and that truly started the day in a humorous mentality. On the car ride, Luz, Professor Obradovich, and I shared stories and pumpkin donuts all the way down to Charleston, IL before checking into our hotels and heading over to EIU.

EIU looks like a castle. I felt as if at any minute, old Disney princesses were going to fly out and start singing about the sunshine that wasn’t present that cloudy afternoon. We checked in and I quickly started getting anxious about what the conference would entail. Before the conference, Luz, all the other ICCJA students, and I went on a tour of the EIU Journalism Department. It was amazing. EIU has their own radio station, television station, yearbook office, and newspaper office. Their office makes our office look like a closet, it was fantastic.

On the first day, Luz and I attended two workshops together. Mostly because I was anxious and didn’t want to be alone with people I didn’t know right off the bat.

The first workshop we attended was about writing columns. We learned that column writing definitely takes time and effort but for most importantly, you have to have the personality for your readers to continue to come back and pick up another issue.

The second workshop was about editing articles. You may be wondering: is this edited? Yes, every article written for the Observer was edited by a member of the editing team. The professor in charge of the workshop was a pretty good speaker despite losing her PowerPoint presentation beforehand.

That night, the ICCJA conference team had a beautifully set up dinner for us and all the other journalism teams from various other community colleges. The keynote speaker was a true crime novelist and alumni of EIU. He shared with us many stories about his time as a true crime novelist and despite not being the best public speaker, he didn’t make me fall asleep, so that means it was a solid job at the least.

Later in the night, Luz and I found ourselves bored in our hotel rooms so we wandered off to a local grocery store. The stars shined brighter than I had ever seen and it felt like a summer night. I must say, it was relaxing. We stayed out until around 12 before heading to bed to another workshop-filled day at the ICCJA Conference.

The second day was a lot more fun. I met many people from the EIU English and Journalism department and learned how to cover my campus better. Although some parts dragged on, the ICCJA Conference benefited me in many ways. I cannot wait for the next conference in Springfield.