3,132,139. According to compete.com, that’s how many unique visitors viewed The Dallas Morning News website in July this year, reading articles covering a wide range of topics such as sports, politics, and local news, the topics varying as wildly as the people who write them. One of those writers will soon be Jesuit’s very own Sam Betanzos ’16.
Through the Local Voices program, Betanzos will be writing opinion columns for The Dallas Morning News website this year. He first heard about the opportunity through Dr. Degen, faculty moderator of The Roundup and English teacher: “Dr. Degen, my junior English teacher, told me about this opportunity and encouraged me to apply. After I researched the program, I realized that it was an awesome opportunity to share my opinions with the Dallas community.”
An awesome opportunity, indeed. Sam is no stranger to the newspaper world or working with opinions. As a Viewpoint editor for The Roundup, Sam leads a section dedicated to reviews and editorials that range from TV and movies to politics and technology. Not merely a supervisor, Betanzos also writes. Unafraid to speak his mind, Sam has made the foray into opinion articles before, writing on controversial topics such as gun control, his most viewed article, which can be found here. His skills, sharpened by his time working on The Roundup, will hopefully translate into interesting and high-quality content for the most popular newspaper in DFW.
Thrilled about the opportunity to add his unique voice to the mix, Sam described his feelings when he found out he landed the job: “I was very excited. Before I received my acceptance email, I thought about all of the students in the greater Dallas – Fort Worth area who had also applied, and I had made peace with the fact that I would probably not be selected to write. The surprise I felt as I read the email made the experience that much more fulfilling. ”
He hopes to expand his repertoire of article topics and write about a wide range of issues in his time with The Dallas Morning News. When asked exactly what he hopes to write about, Sam responded, “The leaders of the Voices program encourage us to write about whatever we find interesting or unique about our daily lives, so there’s no end to the list of topics about which I could write. As of right now, I plan on writing about the benefits of teaching music to young children, why we should be exploring alternative methods of teaching and learning at both the high school and college levels, and the interesting, cathartic effects of writing in a journal regularly. However, I truly hope that my next idea for a column will spring forth organically as I encounter new people, opinions, and experiences throughout my senior year.”
Could we see this young writer delve further into the world of publications? Maybe, maybe not, according to Sam, who noted that he hasn’t “given much consideration specifically to journalism as a career path,” but definitely won’t “rule out the possibility of a career based in writing, like a job in communications.”
Sam hopes to cross-post his Dallas Morning News columns to The Roundup website as opinion pieces, “encouraging Jesuit students and faculty to look out for [his] articles in the coming year.” Some of Sam’s past work for The Roundup can be found here.
