Laura Reilly
New Jersey
Education: Studying Journalism and Media Studies, Cultural Anthropology, and Digital Communication and Information Media at Rutgers the State University of New Jersey. Attended a competitive honors career academy, Communications High School, which gives its students extensive education and experience in communications fields such as journalism, digital video, digital and film photography, visual arts, web design, television and radio production and online business.
Technical Skills: writing (journalistically for news/features/editorials, for businesses and creatively); video filming and editing; podcast hosting and editing; DSLR and film photography; some experience in graphic design and website building. Adobe Photoshop, InDesign and Illustrator; The Microsoft Office suite, Final Cut Pro and basic editing software; basic audio editing software.
Work: Video Editor and news writer for a sub-site of the Spartz Media online conglomerate. The website averages 1.6 million views monthly. Videos on the YouTube channel have currently ammassed over 156,000 views. Also a host (and previous editor) of a weekly podcast on the site that averages 24,000 downloads an episode.
Served as an award-winning staff writer and the print publication editor, features editor and assistant news editor of The Inkblot newspaper (consistently ranked as one of the best student publications internationally) throughout 2008 and 2012. Represented Communications High School at journalism conferences in Washington D.C., Columbia University in New York and Rutgers University in New Jersey.
Worked at: the Eagleton Public Interest Polling center during the 2012 election, interviewing US residents across the country on major political topics for research; the elderly-care center CareOne in 2012, documenting the stories of seniors with dementia for feature profiles culminating in a website; Rutgers University interviewing children whose parents were victims in the 9/11 attacks, and writing their stories for the 10th Anniversary.
Awards and Honors: Girl Scout Gold/Silver/Bronze/Leadership awards, President of the National Honor Society in 2011-2012. Bob Stevens Memorial Scholarship Award for outstanding student journalism. International 1st place for Feature package- Columbia Gold Circle Award. Garden State Scholastic Press Assoc. 2nd place award for In-Depth reporting. Featured on MSG Varsity's