UNL students selected for Collegiate Business Journalism Conference

Four University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Journalism and Mass Communications students were accepted into the Collegiate Business Journalism Conference Oct. 21-23 in New York City.

The three undergraduate students are Kiah Haslett of Omaha, Rosemary Vestal of Westminster, Colo., and Molly Young of Albion. A fourth student, Farooq Baloch, is a graduate student from Karachi, Pakistan.

Hosted by the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, the UNL students join 50 other journalism students from 14 universities across the nation selected for the weekend program. The Collegiate Business Journalism Conference "puts our students together with others who, like them, rank among the most promising young people from colleges all around the country," said Joseph Weber, associate professor of journalism.

Weber, who accompanied the students to New York, teaches classes in business and economic journalism at UNL. "Business and economic journalism is hot right now and will be for years," he said. Weber worked in magazines and newspapers for 35 years. He spent most of that time, 22 years, reporting and writing for Business Week, starting as a correspondent in Dallas and then running the magazine's bureaus in Philadelphia, Toronto and Chicago. He took on the role of chief of correspondents for the organization in early 2006, serving until the summer of 2009.

The students will interview with internship coordinators from the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg News, CNBC.com, Crain's New York, Dow Jones, AP, American City Business Journals, Reuters, Business Insider, BreakingMedia.com, RIABiz.com and TheStreet.com.

"Students will have a wonderful opportunity to make the case for why employers should take a serious look at them," Weber said. "They'll also get to visit the newsrooms of places, such as Dow Jones and Bloomberg, where they might want to work."

Following is a brief bio of the students who are attending the business conference:

Baloch, a journalist and Fulbright fellow, was accepted to UNL in 2009 to pursue a master's degree in journalism and mass communication. Prior to studying at UNL, he served as a city correspondent at The News International, a leading English daily in Pakistan for four years. While there, he reported on education, civic issues, crime and violence. Baloch also interned at the Economic Policy Department, State Bank of Pakistan and Himal South Asian, a Kathmandu, Nepal-based monthly English magazine. He expects to graduate in May.

Haslett is a senior news-editorial and economics major. She works as the associate news editor for the Daily Nebraskan and has also worked at the Arizona Republic in Phoenix as a Pulliam fellow, the Chicago Tribune as a business reporter and Chips Quinn intern and the Omaha World-Herald as a student fellow reporter. In addition, Haslett worked as a media intern for the Nebraska Wheat Board and in the press office of former U.S. Sen. Chuck Hagel.

Vestal is a senior pursuing a double major in broadcast and news-editorial with a minor in political science. Vestal works for the marketing department of the University of Nebraska Press and has worked as a staff writer for a college paper in her hometown. She was recently selected to be one of the first staff writers for a weekly newspaper, The Odyssey. Vestal has traveled abroad to Berlin and Munich to study international media, as well as to Mexico, Australia and South Korea.

Young will graduate in December with degrees in news-editorial and anthropology. Her journalism career began in high school when she reported for her hometown weekly newspaper, the Albion News. Since them, she has reported for newspapers in Omaha, Sioux Falls, S.D., and Minneapolis, where she interned for the Star-Tribune's business desk. In addition, Young is a 2010 graduate of the Chips Quinn Scholar Program and a 2009 graduate of the American Indian Journalism Institute.

Organized by the University of North Carolina, the Collegiate Business Journalism Conference is co-sponsored by the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism, Bloomberg News, the Society of American Business Editors and Writers and Progress Energy. More information about the program is available at http://jomc.unc.edu/nyc2010.

WRITER: Marilyn Hahn