Everything about the student reporter was unfamiliar to me. Moreover, as I have never experienced an activity that requires constant writing, writing an article every month came to me as a bit of pressure.

I was not confident in wiring, and I couldn’t imagine somebody else reading my articles. However, I decided to challenge myself, hoping to get familiarized with newspaper writing.

I still remember my first article, titled “Pfizer Vaccine Experience in Singapore”, which took me a long period of time to submit the first draft, compared to the current time needed.

The draft had to go through a lot of editing process, because I only concentrated on mentioning recent Covid-19 figures, not incorporating reaction of surroundings or the actual experience of vaccination, which should have been the main element of the article.

The structure of it was based on a common newspaper article that I vaguely remember, and I was misunderstanding a lot of sections. Writing an article by only using some type of inaccurate sense of course, ultimately led to a low quality article.

I did not have any knowledge on formal newspaper articles, such as finding a topic that suits, writing with the correct structure and style and choosing a proper vocabulary.

However, with feedback, I started to acknowledge the skills that are expected in newspaper articles. Strengths and weaknesses are both stated in the feedback, so I was able to clearly identify areas that I should improve more, and areas that I should keep going on.

For example, I received little feedback referring to my headline. Headline that summarizes the title of the article is an essential segment, while my previous articles’ headlines only contained a simple explanation of background information of the issue, which is not closely related to the main idea.

As a result, now, the headline is one of the prioritized parts that I always remind myself and check before I submit my first draft.

This situation is applied to other feedback as well. I feel a sense of accomplishment when I find out that the weakness of last month has now changed to the strength for this month from the feedback.

In addition, as time passes, I realized that I am getting to have my own fixed style of writing. My early stage of writing was not consistent and also not refined. I recognized that it was disorganized, but simultaneously also did not know the exact reason.

Now, I believe I have got a consistent style of my own writing through continuous writing and feedback. Now I can write an article in a more organized and consistent style than before. My confidence level increased too.

To be honest, my initial reason to apply as a student reporter was for my portfolio, since it was a great opportunity to show my diligence and interest in significant society issues.
I still think those reasons still work for these days as well, but I am confident that I have learnt and gained more than just a simple portfolio now.