NBC Correspondent Rehema Ellis Speaks at Fordham

"Be informed," was NBC correspondent Rehema Ellis' top piece of advice for aspiring college journalists. "We have the greatest access to news and information than we have ever had before but we are the least informed." 

Ellis spoke to Fordham University students on April 29 in Flom Auditorium regarding how to break into the cutthroat field of journalism. Students took notes energetically as the reporter detailed her 20-year career with NBC News and the steps she took to achieve her current position. Ellis is most famous for being the first NBC news correspondent to report on Sept. 11, 2001 and coined the widely used term, "9-11." Additionally, Ellis has reported on the death of Michael Jackson, the recent earthquake in Haiti and Hurricane Katrina. The correspondent reported from the steps of the Capitol during the inauguration of Barack Obama and stayed in what was then Zaire for an extended period of time to cover the Rwandan genocide. Ellis disclosed to students that although others comment to her about, "how [she] is living the American dream, [she's] still dreaming." She reminded the audience that one must start small. 

"One of the things that I hope all of you will do is intern," Ellis said. "There will be few times in your life where you can afford to work and not get paid, but the truth of it is, you are getting paid because experience is pay."

Ellis explained that internships are key in determining whether what you are doing in the particular job is what you really want to pursue as a career later in life. 

"I went to Simmons College in Boston and I originally wanted to do sociology," Ellis said. "I wanted to work with people, but then I got the notion that I wanted to write, but I just was not sure what exactly."

Following graduation from Simmons, Ellis traveled to Africa to work as a teacher. While overseas, Ellis filled out an application for Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, which brought her back to the United States when she was accepted to the program. Ellis received a scholarship from Westinghouse Broadcasting Company to study at Columbia in exchange for her participation in an internship management program with WINS, an all-news radio station. 

Ellis expressed her distaste with the management proposal at the time but explained that she still wished to get her foot in the door of the communication business, so she nevertheless took on the internship.

"Opportunities do not always knock in the form that you would like them to knock," Ellis said. "They may come with a different heading. You have to have the vision to see beyond the heading."

A recurring theme of the lecture was the tendency of today's media consumers to assume that the words of bloggers or citizen journalists are true without fact-checking the information. 

"Your job is to find out if what someone said makes any sense or even if it is true," Ellis said. "That means you have to do some reporting. You have got to be a reporter. Imagine. You cannot be a stenographer."

The lecture was followed by a question-and-answer session, in which students inquired about internships and Ellis' memorable career moments, specifically her account of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11. 

"9-11 really feels personal," Ellis said of the event. "It hit home for me; I could see the smoke coming from my apartment window. I was more afraid during 9-11 than I ever have been during any story that I have ever covered."

Ellis described feelings of disorientation upon arrival at Ground Zero and was not even able to recognize the Brooklyn Bridge due to it being filled with running people rather than vehicles.

"Our nation is in a state of 9-1-1-," Ellis recalled stating to a police officer standing nearby.

Ellis stood in line at a pay phone and proceeded to call Tom Brokaw and report live from Ground Zero without a camera or audio equipment. 

"The most troubling part about going down to Ground Zero was that everyone else was heading up," Ellis said. "The people looked at me and they said, ‘What are you doing? Turn around that's the wrong way.' My job is to go down. Down into harm's way."

In order not to conclude the talk in a somber manner, Ellis changed the subject when a student asked her a final question. Ellis wrapped up the talk by advising how not to incorporate one's own opinion when reporting a news story and how to balance one's personal and professional lives simultaneously. 

Currently, Ellis' reports appear on MSNBC, "The Today Show" and NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams. Ellis has also been taking strides with new media by Tweeting, blogging and writing regular articles for NBC Online.