Anchor Lauren Evans inspires young journalists

At the age of 5, WILX news anchor Lauren Evans already showed a passion for broadcast journalism when she and her sister recorded their own news production in their kitchen.

“I love reporting the news. It’s really fun seeing how things unfold and it’s really fascinating how it keeps you on your toes,” Evans said. “I like my job because it changes things up a little bit on a day to day basis; it’s better than sitting at a desk.”

Evans grew up in Birmingham, MI where she was always happy to call home.  She thrived at doing forensics in high school, especially in the broadcasting category.

“I really liked it and I knew I would miss it if I didn’t keep doing it,” Evans said. “So that’s how I fell into it so to speak.”

Knowing she could not give her love of broadcasting up so easily, Evans majored in Broadcast Journalism and Political Science at the University of Southern California (USC). While she was in college she anchored and reported for the award-winning USC newscast and also covered a wide variety of controversial issues through the Annenberg News.

She took that knowledge to her internships at KNBC Investigative Unit, Good Morning America, MTV, and WJRT-TV in Flint. These internships helped her land a job at WILX  news in Lansing.

“If you want to be a broadcaster the first thing I recommend is to intern anywhere you can,” Evans said. “You can get the most hands on, real world experience and sort of hone where you might like to work or what areas you might be interested in.”

With the new push for digital media, Evans uses it to influence her audience. By using different social media sites, she is able to send out content that informs the public in a quicker and faster way. Being young herself, she inspires many young journalists on the proper use of social media.

“Obviously teenagers are leading the charge on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and all that stuff,” Evans said. “Of course it is also important to be appropriate and to tweet about appropriate things because once it is on the internet, it is there forever.”

Evans makes sure to connect with her audience by tweeting backstage photos of her and her co-anchor Jason Colthorp having fun but then she will also tweet breaking news, accidents, traffic, and other important news stories.

Even though Evans has an impressive background in the broadcasting industry, she knew Michigan was where she wanted to call home. Through tours, job shadows, and interviews Evans stresses the importance of giving back to the young journalists of Michigan.

Recently the students of the MIPA workshop class, Smile Your On Camera, took a visit to WILX news station. They sat in on a live broadcast of the five o’clock news and received a tour from Evans herself.

“She was really put together and presentable to go on the air. She kept focused on her main goal of the live broadcast but also paid close attention to us on the breaks,” Waterford High School senior Carson Eungard said. “She made sure all of our questions were answered and was very down to earth and personable. It was really cool to see her on and off the camera with such fast transitions.”

 

 

Contributors: Meg Dedyne & Lauren Kostiuk & Shannon Stoudemire