Superstar Status
Team Monday's MVP this week goes to...Brad Streicher!
Brad Streicher is our male lead anchor on Mondays, and this week he did an excellent job at embracing a new challenge! Brad comes into the Media Center around noon, so he often does not have time to shoot and edit his own package. Since we only had two more shows left, I wanted to give Brad the opportunity to really sink his teeth into his own reporting.
That Monday morning, ISIS released a graphic video. It showed that American aid worker Peter Kassig was beheaded. I told Brad that I wanted him to report in front of the monitor to explain to our viewers why this new video is different than other ones ISIS created.
Brad was initially a little overwhelmed! I think he got a little too comfortable reporting from behind the desk! After we talked about it further, he was ready to give it a shot.
I was so impressed. He went beyond my original vision for the coverage and took initiative to ask me to change the format on the rundown. He decided to start the segment off with a powerful sound bite from the latest ISIS video, and then proceeded to articulate the differences in a graphic.
It is not easy trying something new, especially when the subject of your assigned news story is complicated and controversial. I am proud of Brad for stepping out of his comfort zone and for contributing a fascinating analysis to our show. One of my goals this semester, as an ATVN producer, is to report more international news stories in innovative ways. Sometimes I think we hesitate to cover international stories, because we assume that we cannot "make it our own." Brad deserves the MVP title this week because he is proof that nothing holds ATVN back from reporting stories that matter!
