Behind The Desk: Working hard and reaping the rewards


In ninth grade, I joined the staff of my high school newspaper, The Gamut. It was distributed once a month, and often ended up stacked in the corner of the AP Biology classroom, to serve its ultimate purpose of protecting the tables from stray frog organs. My first assignment was to profile the four new […]

Behind the Desk: Serving a greater purpose


I used to be an incredibly shy person. I’ve been told that, as a young child, my first reaction when encountering unfamiliar adults was to cry, refuse to speak or hide behind the safety of my mom’s legs — or all three. I’m not exactly sure why I was like this. Perhaps it was because […]

Behind the Desk: The Road to Editorial Director


I took over as the editorial director of the Daily Trojan in the third week of Spring 2017 after one week of shadowing my predecessor. At the beginning of the semester, I was preparing for my new role as an editorial assistant; my first big surprise on the Daily Trojan’s staff came when I learned […]

Behind the Desk: New Beginnings in the Newsroom


I would have never imagined being the news editor for the Daily Trojan my freshman year — but here I am, spending over 25 hours per week on the fourth floor of the Student Union building. I love it here, probably because my co-editors actually laugh at my cheesy and dumb jokes. As one of […]

Behind the Desk: A Lifestyle Change


  I am writing this in the newsroom to the constant hum of our old Mac desktops. It is five minutes ‘til 5 p.m., five minutes until the newsroom comes alive on Monday evenings to the sound of rapid mouse clicks, furious taps of keyboard keys and spontaneous bursts of laughter from every corner of […]

Behind the Desk: Through the Lens


Sorry, Paulina. I know I got this to you a good week after you wanted it. But as I’m sure you know and have seen, being a journalist never stops. So, as I sit in my dark dorm room at 2 a.m. after a long edit session with my lamp light illuminating the keyboard and […]

Behind the Desk: A Newsroom Full of Traditions


For as long as anyone can remember, the corner room on the fourth floor of the Student Union has belonged to the Daily Trojan. Mona Cravens, USC’s director of student publications, has worked here for 40 years and says the newsroom has always been here, exactly as it is now. The editor-in-chief’s office, where so […]

There’s no I in DT


Last night, to avoid writing the final paper of my undergraduate career, I started calculating how much time I had spent in the Daily Trojan newsroom during my time at USC. We begin production at 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday and routinely stay until almost midnight. On Sunday, we start at noon (brunch provided) and […]

Flashback Friday: When Emma met the DT…


When I’ve asked most other journalism majors or aspiring reporters what inspired them to enter the world of journalism, the answers I get are normally something along the lines of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the real-life sleuth superheroes fighting for good in All the President’s Men. But for me, it was Sally Albright — […]