Breaking down The Sheraton Sherpa



Reappropriated without permission from Sarah M. Zerwin.

Much to my dismay, my proposed publication name, the Sheraton Sherpa, was summarily shot down by Alan Weintraut, who clearly had an axe to grind after being out-punned on Facebook.

And, by the way, to show how upset I am, I deliberately went against the AP Style on ax. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Mr. Rewrite!

In all seriousness, though, I think those two words together really do a lot toward explaining what made this trip a unique experience.

Sheraton: This part has everything to do with the way that the Reynolds Institute, ASNE and ASU rolled out the red carpet for us. Going in, I had no idea what to expect from the weather or the living arrangements. Even though we had already seen some of the Reynolds generosity with the resources and flight arrangements, there were many ways it could have gone wrong.
The Sheraton was perfectly located and proved the ideal setting for a group of adults to conduct a two-week confererence with all the comforts and amenities we needed. The free internet and the $5 coupons were definitely deal breakers, of course.

The Sheraton also speaks more generally to the social element of the trip--the (reasonably) late-night sessions in the lobby, the baseball game, karaoke night and Cronkite Clue. One of my few regrets is that I stayed in my room early on and probably missed some great opportunities to get to know people. The other regret is that I never got up quite early enough to see the Phoenix sunrise or to take advantage of the pool and exercise room. Kudos to those who did all these things!


Reappropriated without permission from Marlo Spritzer.

Sherpa: This part could easily reference the crazy sense of humor in our cohort--both among the Reynolds fellows and presenters. (I may always be left wondering if Tracy Collins added that sherpa stuff into his design presentation based on the group Facebook page or if it was coincidence).
"Sherpa" could also reference the extreme climate of Phoenix (seriously, what sort of city has a dust storm? Is this the Sahara?), which, of course, will take us all back to our video journalism experiences.

However, I would like to take "sherpa" back to its original sense and say that part of the name relates to the guidance we received, which we now will be able to take back and use ourselves to guide the next generation.

For me, this experience wasn't as much about learning  journalism, but teaching it. Even though I already have my master's in multimedia journalism and newsroom experience, in the classroom, all of the tacit knowledge I have about practicing journalism will go out the window. I was delighted to take a  step back during sessions like newswriting and AP style in order to see how the experts made teaching them engaging. It has caused me to reflect on my own lecture-heavy practices and to think of how I can adapt some of the more hands-on, activity-based lessons that Steve and Alan used.

Getting more resources and insight into how to set up the journalism program by hearing Alan and all our other veteran teachers discuss theirs was also huge.

Thanks so much for all the memories and resources! I will look forward to keeping up with you all on Facebook and Twitter (anyone on LinkedIn?)--at least until social media goes the way of the dodo, assuming my publication story is correct.

Ben Sellers
North Stafford High School
Stafford, Va.