Here's how student media director Marti Harvey described the job duties at the UP's May 21 staff meeting...
This is about things like when there's paperwork to be filled out and I need someone to help with that. It's about things like when I'm negotiating with athletics about doing away games and they would like someone from the UP, and someone from Owl TV, and someone from Owl Radio and I have someone here who's available to go with me to those meetings to get everything set.
With tasks like those, I'm not exactly devastated I failed to make the first cut.
So what happened? I lack a bachelor's degree. Unlike almost every other job I've ever applied for – including FAU's newspaper adviser 12 years ago – this one doesn't permit swapping experience for education.
And I'm fine with that.
I explained my situation in the cover letter to the right (click to enlarge). Yet I make no excuse for what's my fault.
Here's what I'm not fine with: Many of the 49 applicants deemed more qualified than me have nothing but a bachelor's degree.
Among them...
• A woman who graduated last year and works as a "radio promotions assistant" when she's not a sales assistant at Banana Republic.
• A "Customer Service professional" who has been the "primary point of contact for stakeholder communications of editorial and content ingestion incidents which include executive level updates to both RealNetworks (RN) and Multiple Cellular Content Provider Senior Management Teams."
• The 2008 manager of FAU's student-run TV station who now operates a camera at Dolphin Stadium.
To be clear: I'm no elitist. Working retail and being young is not a crime. (But writing about "editorial and content ingestion incidents" should be.)
They're also not a qualification for being second in command of a student media department.
Among the applicants are a handful of talented folks. I hope one of them gets the job. The search committee met yesterday for the first time and plans to recommend a finalist by early August.
Here's what I find weird...
1. To FAU, a college degree seems to be more important than media experience. The original job description only required two years of experience until the ensuing bad press shamed FAU into doubling that. Now the search committee has to vet at least a dozen applicants who are clearly unprepared to handle the chores. Or at least, I hope that's clear.
2. Student media director Marti Harvey is the "hiring authority." Which means she has the final say. Will she really hire someone with more media experience than she has? Or does that make her uncomfortable? (It seemed to strain our relationship.) It's already documented that Marti has worked less than two years as a pro media manager. Several candidates – the best ones, in fact – have much more than that, and at much larger media outlets.
3. Marti has said her assistant will mostly work at the TV and radio station, with only "some responsibilities for the UP." She has yet to announce when the UP will get its full-time adviser – which she explained last month as the reason I was fired, and which she promised was coming "in a short period of time."
TOMORROW: The ethics of advertising at FAU.
