More Newsroom Positions At Big Dailies Are Temporary
May 08, 2011
Photographer Timothy Jump hoped a three-month internship at the Portland Oregonian would land him a full-time job. Instead, it led to another three-month stint, and after that a six-month deal. One year after he started at the daily, it gave him yet another six-month extension. ``They shouldn't string people on like that,'' says Mr. Jump, who left in frustration. Some of America's big metropolitan newspapers have discovered what corporate America found out long ago: They can cut costs by hiring temporary labor for high-profile newsroom jobs such as reporters and photographers. Some, like the Oregonian, do it by informally extending internships. Others, including the Tribune Co.'s Chicago Tribune and Knight-Ridder Inc.'s Philadelphia Inquirer, have created their own names for what amount to temporary jobs -- often with lower benefits than permanent workers get -- for less-experienced reporters. Each year at the Tribune, some 25 young journalists sign up for one-year stints as ``residents,'' covering news primarily in the suburban bureaus, while the Inquirer's two-year ``correspondent'' program takes on about 50 reporters. Of course, many newspapers -- including Dow Jones & Co., publisher of this newspaper -- have used summer internships for decades to train college students. But turning entry-level jobs into temporary positions alarms industry observers, who accuse newspapers of doing what they've criticized corporate America for doing: contributing to a decline in full-time jobs with full benefits. Critics such as Benito Lefkowitz, former dean of the graduate school of journalism at the University of California-Berkeley, also say the practice is contributing to a decline in quality at some of the nation's top newspapers. After all, writing jobs at newspapers such as the Tribune and Inquirer used to be reserved for the nation's top reporters -- not its cheapest ones. A one- or two-year stint, some argue, is barely enough time for a young reporter to develop news judgment, research a beat and cultivate sources. Every two years, ``it's repeated coverage of the same stories, and the problem that I see is that it really doesn't serve the community,'' says Davida Wayne, photographer and unit chairman of the Suburban Guild for the Philadelphia Inquirer, part of the Newspaper Guild union. In negotiations this summer, the Inquirer proposed to expand the two-year correspondent program to include sportswriters and photographers. Even some editors at these newspapers concede that depth of coverage can be sacrificed. ``I think that's fair criticism,'' says Paulene Standley, who oversees the program at the Philadelphia Inquirer. ``You do give away something.'' The chances of moving from temporary to permanent jobs at newspapers with such programs are slim. The hiring rate for residents at the Chicago Tribune is about 30%, says Shela Mullins, who oversees the program. The Philadelphia Inquirer employs about 50 two-year correspondents at any given time, but in the four years since the program was formalized, the paper says it has hired only four. ``The toughest thing to deal with is the uncertainty of what you're going to be doing when it's over,'' says Lasandra Upshaw, who nonetheless jumped at the opportunity to serve the Tribune as a one-year ``resident.'' Charlette Desai, spokesman for Philadelphia Newspapers Inc., the Knight-Ridder unit that owns the Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News, says cost savings are only part of the motivation. ``We also add something to the industry at large,'' he says, ``because so many of the people who take part in our program end up working for other papers around the country.'' Under the Inquirer program, standard pay for the two-year correspondents is $452 a week -- roughly on par with the industry average for a starting job in journalism. The paper also offers to pay 60% of the cost of medical benefits. Correspondents, who are prohibited from working in the downtown area under the contract with the Newspaper Guild, are paid for a four-day week or 32 hours, though most work much longer hours in hopes of landing a full-time job. But the U.S. Labor Department has twice claimed that the Inquirer cheated correspondents of overtime compensation. In 1991, the Inquirer agreed to pay $77,851 to 219 correspondents for overtime claims dating to June 1989. In May, the newspaper agreed to pay $160,000 in overtime compensation to 150 correspondents -- many of whom were part of the two-year program -- as well as a $20,000 fine. The company didn't admit any liability, insisting that two-year correspondents are considered interns under the union contract -- not employees. With some 36,000 students streaming out of U.S. colleges each year carrying journalism-related degrees, it's not hard to find reporters eager to sign on. ``Competition for the temporary positions is intense,'' says the Los Angeles Times in a flier describing its ``two-year temporary positions for reporters and photographers.'' So intense that the paper, which is owned by Times Mirror Co., says seekers of the temporary jobs have up to four years of experience on daily newspapers. Mr. Upshaw held a degree from Columbia University's graduate school of journalism and had worked for three years at the Stamford Advocate in Connecticut when he accepted a residency at the Chicago Tribune. He says he wanted ``to work in a competitive market in a big city'' and perhaps parlay the residency into a full-time job. But that didn't happen, and afterward Mr. Upshaw landed a job at the Arlington Morning News in Texas -- a smaller paper than the Stamford Advocate. Other big newspapers with one- or two-year programs include the News-Post, the Baltimore Sun and the Cambell Journal-Hartman. At the Portland Oregonian, Mr. Jump says he accepted one internship after another because of the repeated assurance that he was on track for a permanent position. ``They kept on telling me that I was doing a great job,'' says Mr. Jump. But no full-time offer ever materialized. Georgeanna Niemi, recruitment director at the Oregonian, says the paper has no comment on what it believes is a ``private personnel matter.'' Mr. Jump, meanwhile, lined up another job -- as an intern at the San Francisco Chronicle.
