Joe Drape Reaction

This was the visit I had circled on our syllabus the whole semester. I couldn't wait to listen to the New York Times' Joe Drape talk to our class, and I didn't even care about what he said about the book. I was more interested in his career, how he got where he was and what to do to get there.

Drape is an example that I want to follow. All my life I've been working to get to that point, and it's going to be a long ways off, but it was the most interesting journalism person I've talked to in my life. I am still intrigued, in fact, that I will try to keep in contact with Drape through e-mail over time.

You can't ask for any better of a source to have than Drape. He's been through everything and knows the in's and out's of the newspaper business. I enjoyed speaking with him after class for awhile and it was encouraging to listen to him.

I haven't e-mailed him yet, because I'm waiting to finish a story I've been working on for over a month. I believe it's the best story I have written in my career, but it's controversial in nature so the Eagle and VYPE magazine have backed off running the story. After I finish penning it, I plan to send it to Drape and get his critique of it and see if I can get it published anywhere.

This was one of the most beneficial visits of the semester and in the future for this class, I think it would be awesome to book more big-time journalists like Drape to speak with the class.