By: Madelynn Lockwood, Features Editor
On March 6, “The Griffin” editorial staff hit the streets of La Jolla, California to attend the Associated Collegiate Press’s Spring College Media Conference. This is the second trip that this staff has been able to experience this conference, and both times we have learned mountains of information which we are employing both within our paper and toward our future careers.
We started our Wednesday with a noon flight out of Buffalo, NY into sunny Las Vegas, NV: while this editor had a bit of a bumpy flight and a less-than-ideal layover in Sin City, it seems as if the rest of the staff enjoyed their downtime. Our afternoon flight departed around dinnertime, and we were off to the Golden State for our final destination.
Thursday marked the first day of the conference and the beginning of our trip’s true purpose. The bulk of the conference consisted of a diverse assortment of breakout sessions that had interesting topics such as “How to piss off USC's head coach and keep your job” and “Canva for newsrooms,” neither of which was truly applicable to the Features staff, but we marked them as our favorites anyway. Moments between sessions were marked with turkey sandwiches, some fresh air and the recurring question of “Hey, what do you think Dan’s up to right now?” After a good couple of hours of these breakouts, we closed out our night with a keynote speaker and a complimentary dinner on the pool deck.
Friday’s and Saturday’s conference events followed similar patterns of breakouts and keynotes but unfortunately no more free dinners. Along the way we made friends with The Scarlet newspaper of Clark University, who we somehow ran into time and time again.
Regardless of the amount of knowledge that we gained (and hopefully our readers notice!), our lasting memories will not be the ones made in the conference. We were lucky enough to have free time, some directionally talented friends, access to public transportation and a lot of adrenaline that allowed us to explore the gems that are San Diego and La Jolla, CA.
With the amount of time that we were able to explore, we found ourselves in Torrey Pines Nature Reserve, the La Jolla Cove, downtown San Diego, Balboa Park and the Seaside Village of the Port of San Diego. We were inspired to see the most we could in the time we had: many days that meant being up at 6 a.m. (okay, no one point out that it was 9 a.m. at home) and going to bed far too late at night. It’s Canisius’ fault for getting us a hotel with a pool.
Our last night ended exactly this way, in the most perfect way possible, at a little ice cream shop adjacent to our hotel. We chatted, ate some of the most delicious ice cream in California and found ourselves some chairs that spun like tops to keep us entertained until the security staff so kindly let us know that the courtyard area had been closed for an hour.
We had an early morning flight coupled with daylight saving time, so most of us didn’t bother catching any sleep before heading back to Buffalo. With this I will leave you with two thoughts: I hope that you take note of the changes and new knowledge that we acquired on the trip, and I hope that you are inspired to take the next opportunity to grow and share a part of you with others.