And with the news, here’s Mandy Furru and Ellen Bartyzal

Many interns are often expected to merely observe and shadow employees. College of Saint Benedict students Mandy Furru and Ellen Bartyzal had an entirely different experience as the 2016 Minnesota Public Radio/Gary Eichten Fellows.

The two worked full-time over the summer learning the basics of news writing, reporting and production with a goal to write and produce material for MPR newscasts. The prestigious fellowship opportunity was created in honor of Eichten, a 1969 Saint John's University graduate who served as a host, news director, special events producer and station manager during his 40-plus-year career at MPR.

"Since I don't have much experience in journalism, I was expecting to go through a lot of writing and reporting exercises to get ready for the real thing. However, after a few days of training, we really hit the ground running and ended up gaining a lot of practical experience," Furru said.

"When I walked into the job on the first day, I expected that our work would consist of a lot of web stories and a lot of assisting reporters. I didn't expect them to have us do a lot of our own work. But by the time I left, I was writing a few news spots a day and completely comfortable with calling out to various sources and requesting information," Bartyzal said.

Bartyzal, a junior communication major and English minor from New Prague, Minnesota, arrived at the MPR offices with the greater experience in media. She has been a regular contributor to The Record, the school newspaper at CSB and SJU, since her first year on campus. She became news editor her sophomore year, and is a media relations assistant in the CSB/SJU Office of Marketing and Communications.

Learn more about the Eichten Fellows Program

Furru, a senior Asian studies and political science double-major from Vadnais Heights, Minnesota, was less familiar with the media, having a short stint with her high school paper. However, her interest in media was invigorated while she was studying abroad in China. There, she came into contact with real tragedies and calamities, bringing distant problems to the forefront of her care.

"Talking with students from countries afflicted by war, terrorism and poverty made the news stories I was reading come to life. It's easy to read the news on your phone, close the app and then go on with your day. But the issues reported in the news are usually ongoing, and affect real people," Furru said.

The two worked side-by-side in the same corner of their office, often times on different stories, but always seeking out one another for input.

"We shared a corner office and spent most of our days together. I really enjoyed working with Mandy and I think we both taught each other things that added to the experience of the fellowship." Bartyzal said.

"There was a lot of Bennie power going on in the corner office. It was great," Furru said.

The preponderance of their work was to formulate news spots, which are the 40-50 second stories that are read at the top of every hour. To do this, the two would gather news tips from press releases, make calls to potential sources and finally write the script for the story.

Beyond this, they also went out into the field to report on events as they occurred.

Once such event that aroused their interest was the seven-day Allina Health nurses' strike. The students took away many lessons from MPR's coverage, including a decision not to run a story pitched by the nurses' union.

"At the end of the day, Lorna Benson (a reporter who covers health issues at MPR) decided the story wasn't worth reporting — it didn't meet MPR standards. ... I think this experience was most memorable for me because I really saw how much a reporter needs to think about what's at stake for the characters in their story. They need to be sure to report on the facts," Bartyzal said.

All the while, they were encouraged and instructed by the sagacious radio-host Eichten, who met with them once a week.

"Gary is a kind-hearted man with a great sense of humor who really knows his stuff. We only met once a week, but he helped me improve my voicing technique significantly.  He was and is a great mentor," Furru said.

"It was so fun working with him this summer. He knows so much about radio and offered a lot of information and advice to both of us. He has been an incredible mentor for me and has truly gone above and beyond to help me succeed in this internship and in my future career," Bartyzal said.

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