El Paso, the safest city in the U.S. by fact, the most dangerous by media coverage. (José Luis Trejo/Borderzine.com)

El Paso is still the safe, prosperous Sun City it has always been

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EL PASO – As editor-in-chief of The Prospector and Minero Magazine, reporter for Borderzine and the occasional freelance journalism work I have been able to take around El Paso, I find hard to believe the image many have of this city. As the drug-related violence continues in our sister city, Ciudad Juárez, the borderland has been in the national spotlight with various media outlets focusing on the drug-war. Even though El Paso was ranked as one of the safest cities in the U.S. by CQ press in 2010, the city is still perceived as a dangerous city due to its proximity to Juárez. When I went on an internship at the Houston Chronicle in 2010, once people found out I was from El Paso they all would ask the same questions: how dangerous is El Paso? Is it true that the violence has spilled over to El Paso?

Don’t let internship opportunities pass you by

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EL PASO – As I start my senior year this summer studying multimedia journalism at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), I realized I had to take a bigger step toward acquiring that experience we are constantly told we need. That is, building my resume even more by obtaining an internship. By the end of Fall 2010 semester, I had already sent all of my applications to several newsrooms across the country and to my surprise, I got a phone call from Washington D.C. It turned out I was one of the finalists to be selected as an intern for The Hispanic Link. I interviewed with Charlie Ericksen and he told me to wait for a phone call as they would notify me in several weeks that if I would be the chosen intern. I never got that call.

Read all about it – some last words for the printed word

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EL PASO, Texas — Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to honor the heroes, the visionaries, the martyrs, the teachers, the mentors and the smart-asses that have contributed to the legacy of Print Media here at the University of Texas at El Paso. In these times of great technological advancement, the souls that lie buried in the ink of the pages that challenged authority, informed the populous and bled perspective will never be forgotten. In our borderland, the border we face is not only that which divides our twin cities. We also approach an epochal border, moving into a digital age where the blog is the new editorial, craigslist is the new classified ads and RSS feeds are the new paperboys. On November 2, 2009, former ABC White House correspondent Sam Donaldson announced the creation of a new degree at UTEP: Multimedia Journalism.

Being bicultural and bilingual propelled Mike Martinez to success

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EL PASO, Texas — Stepping out of a business meeting to negotiate his transfer from San Juan, Puerto Rico to Chicago, Mike Martinez looked out into a violent Chicago blizzard. “It was snowing horizontally,” he recalled. He had been promised a move to Spain — a dream job for him — but the company decided they needed his skills at a national office. It was Christmas Day. He called his wife in San Juan telling her about the storm and asked her, “So, how would you like to move to Chicago?”

New frontline in war on freedom of speech

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EL PASO, Texas — College campuses are and should be considered a utopia for students, faculty and staff to make their voices heard, whether espousing new ideas or protesting against the injustices of the world. Recent events at universities across the nation make it painfully clear this is no longer true. A significant case of censorship in college media recently occurred with the firing of an advisor at the University of Colorado at Boulder’s student newspaper, the CU Independent. After being fired from her position, Amy Herdy claimed the reason behind her dismissal was retaliation for her attempts to defend her students from hassles they were receiving from faculty after stories were published in the paper. Herdy also said that Paul Voakes, dean of UC-Boulder, requested that the advisor provide him with notification if the student newspaper planned to run anything that the university may deem to be controversial.

C-ya ‘round suckas!

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EL PASO, Texas — It is The Prospector tradition that the graduating seniors write a goodbye column.
 So, now that my time here at UTEP is coming to a close, I can’t help but take a look back at my journey. Years ago, if anyone asked me what I was going to do with my life, I would not have had an answer. But now that I am graduating, I am excited to say that I have an answer to that question –a journalist. There are many people out there that will say that journalism is a dying field and that the odds of finding a job are slim. The truth is that journalism is an evolving field and this is a very exciting time to be entering the workforce.