Florida International university (FIU) partnered with the Florida Scholastic Press Association (FSPA) on Saturday, Oct. 21 to host the 45th annual South Florida Journalism Day. Journalism day (J-Day) is a day in which students from various publications from all over Miami-Dade County (District 6), come together to learn more about what it means to be a journalist and how to improve their journalistic skills. This year, the themes for J-Day were “Journalists are Superheroes” and “With Great Power Comes Great Responsibilities.” One way that this theme was reflected throughout this event was by having the seminars titled after superheroes and their movie catchphrases, such as “How to Shoot Like Peter Parker,” “It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s an Interview: Asking the Right Questions,” “Superhero Athletes: Covering Sports for All Media” and “Robin is Red, Nightwing is Blue, Rhyming is Hard, I’m Batman: Creative Ideas for Literary Magazines.”

Students were able to meet and speak to CBS4 News Anchor, Lauren Pastrana. As she spoke, Pastrana focused on detailing the importance of her job and other people’s views of the profession. She emphasized that as a journalist, it is imperative to always be honest and maintain integrity. After opening remarks, several students signed up for On-the-Spot competitions. Categories included but were not limited to Creative Writing, Feature Writing and even Broadcast. Various Gables students won these competitions: Ana Capiro (CavsConnect) won 1st Place On the Spot Newswriting, Samantha Correa (Cavaleon) won 2nd Place On the Spot Newswriting, Camila Blanco (Catharsis) won 2nd Place On the Spot Creative Writing, Maria F. Estrada (CavsConnect) won 3rd Place On the Spot Feature Writing and Gables Live was awarded Honorable Mention for their On the Spot Broadcast Package.

“I went to a couple of seminars and I heard a lot of different perspectives about the different areas of journalism. Interacting with people from other publications from our school and bonding with the Catharsis staff was an amazing experience,” senior Camila Blanco said.

Throughout the day, students attended many different seminars given by different advisers and special guests. There were seminar sessions for those interested in writing or working for a newspaper, yearbook, literary magazine, online news website and TV production/broadcast. Writers learned how to improve their writing for opinion, sports, news, features and spotlight pieces, while photographers received tips about how to take the perfect picture.

“I worked on an on-the-spot commentary broadcasting competition at J-Day about the theme ‘are we slaves to technology’ as well as attended workshops after we turned in our video. My favorite part of J-Day was being around so many passionate young people. Everyone was so dedicated to their work and excited to learn new things,” sophomore Julianna Goldfarb said.

J-Day was an overall success and ended on a very exciting note. CavsConnect’s very own Co-Editor-in-Chief, Maria F. Estrada was elected by all attendees at the event as the District 6 Representative for the Florida Scholastic Press Association State Convention this spring alongside Giulana Restrepo from John A. Ferguson Senior High School. She will serve on the Executive Board along with the other District Representatives and Student Chairs.