NBC News Correspondent Stephanie Gosk Speaks to Middle School Students

 

After playing several video clips of her on-air reporting for NBC Nightly News and The Today Show, Ms. Gosk explained the off-air logistics of the job. She described how she receives her assignments, where she has to go and how she gets there; and what professional standards are and how she maintains them. When asked if it was sometimes difficult to interview someone that she disliked or knew was lying, Ms. Gosk responded that it was important to keep  her own emotions, or biases, in check “so that the people watching can form their own opinions.”

Students were interested to learn that Ms. Gosk places great value on guides who can help her navigate the vastly different cultures in which she finds herself and advise her about the unforeseeable dangers she might encounter. For example, she was surprised to discover that the indigenous black mambo snake had the potential to be more life threatening than the insurgents she was planning to meet on one foreign assignment. “It’s important to have someone with you who knows more about the place you are in than you do” Ms. Gosk advised, adding that she immediately acquired a pair of sturdy boots before setting out to meet her contacts.

Then it was the students’ turn to interview the reporter. Questions led to discussions about the role of news in societies and what truth means to different people. “The students asked some insightful questions and I know that they now have a fuller perspective of what it takes to get the news we watch every night– and why it’s so important that someone is out there, travelling to all of these places and doing this job for the rest of us,” said fifth grade teacher Tracy Spain.