I’m working to collect resources and strategies that have helped journalists prevent or overcome burnout, and I want to hear what’s helped you! If you have resources you’d be willing to share, I’d love it if you post them in this thread or email me so I can collect them in a Google Sheet or Doc.
I am a student journalist at the University of Southern California. I recently received a scholarship to work on a semester-long project raising awareness surrounding mental health in student newsrooms. I'm currently finishing up an online toolkit that I've put together for student journalists (and professionals too!) to learn about how to identify and deal with burnout. I've also collected anecdotes from student journalists around the country on how they have struggled or practiced self-care. Burnout in college journalism is a problem because we need more voices in this field! My website will go live at studentjournalismwellnessproject.wordpress.com on May 7th! Thanks for gathering these resources for reporters!
For mental health sake when I feel burned out I find I need to take a step back from engaging with other journalists or platforms who talk a LOT about their salary and how productive they are. It makes me feel ashamed of my own limits and angry at them for daring to thrive when I can't. Some writers really love talking metrics about how much they make, how many pitches they sent, their financial goals and for a long time I thought I had to do the same in order to be serious about my business. I don't think that's true. I personally some people love numbers because numbers are easier for them than people.
I am a student journalist at the University of Southern California. I recently received a scholarship to work on a semester-long project raising awareness surrounding mental health in student newsrooms. I'm currently finishing up an online toolkit that I've put together for student journalists (and professionals too!) to learn about how to identify and deal with burnout. I've also collected anecdotes from student journalists around the country on how they have struggled or practiced self-care. Burnout in college journalism is a problem because we need more voices in this field! My website will go live at studentjournalismwellnessproject.wordpress.com on May 7th! Thanks for gathering these resources for reporters!
At the American Press Institute, we just published this resource to help news organizations think through what work they can stop doing (story types, tasks, etc,), so as to create space for more meaningful work. https://www.americanpressinstitute.org/publications/articles/how-newsrooms-can-do-less-work-but-have-more-impact/
For mental health sake when I feel burned out I find I need to take a step back from engaging with other journalists or platforms who talk a LOT about their salary and how productive they are. It makes me feel ashamed of my own limits and angry at them for daring to thrive when I can't. Some writers really love talking metrics about how much they make, how many pitches they sent, their financial goals and for a long time I thought I had to do the same in order to be serious about my business. I don't think that's true. I personally some people love numbers because numbers are easier for them than people.