Professional experience gained at WOUB gave Tom Bosco a leg up

Tom Bosco says the newsroom he works in at ABC 6/Fox 28 TV in Columbus is like Athens northwest. It’s full of anchors, reporters, and producers who went to Ohio University and started their careers as student reporters at WOUB Public Media.

“I know if my managers hire someone from Ohio University, they are going to know what they are doing,” said Bosco. “Because of the experience they can get at WOUB, they’re already several steps ahead of the game. It’s been that way for a long time.”

Bosco came to Athens from Cincinnati, Ohio. He knew he wanted to study journalism, and after taking a tour of Ohio University’s campus, Bosco knew it was the school for him.

“I knew the first time I visited,” said Bosco. “I knew it was a great journalism school for both broadcasting and print journalism. At the time, I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to do broadcast or print. But it didn’t take me too long to figure that out.”

As a freshman, Bosco started working at the South Green radio station. By his sophomore year, a friend “dragged” Bosco up to WOUB.

“I fell in love from there,” said Bosco. “I started out wrapping cables with the engineers, and then I eventually gravitated over to the newsroom. I ended up being paid to work for former Assistant News Director Fred Kight. That meant I was in the newsroom every single day gathering news and doing radio newscasts on WOUB FM. I also was a disc jockey on WOUB AM and hosted classical music on WOUB FM.”

While Bosco enjoyed the daily newsroom experience he was gaining, he also loved the opportunity to learn and grow during special live news coverage events.

“Election night was the best,” said Bosco. “I remember we were each given a county to cover and would line up at the microphone to read results on the radio. I remember thinking that people were sitting at home in those counties listening to us and getting results live from us, not thinking of us as dinky students, but real professional journalists providing valuable information.”

While Bosco loved his work on the radio, he also took the opportunity to explore TV news by working on WOUB’s nightly TV newscast, NewsWatch.

“I did ACTV 7 TV as a journalism class and then started working on NewsWatch,” said Bosco. “I loved that the journalism school had a class in its curriculum where we put on a newscast every day and that I could continue to learn about TV at WOUB. What I loved the most was it was not a closed circuit where no one could see the broadcast. Both shows were real nightly newscasts that were shown out in the community.”

During winter break of Bosco’s senior year, he was able to secure an internship at an AM news radio station in Cincinnati. He got the opportunity to do some reporting for the station and attributes that opportunity to the experience he gained at WOUB.

“I ran around Cincinnati covering news and doing radio reports,” said Bosco. “I couldn’t believe they aired my reports in Cincinnati. I was still a green college student, but I was able to legitimately be a professional journalist because of what I learned at WOUB. I was able to perform at a professional level and have these stories air in Cincinnati.”

After Bosco graduated in 1992, he went back to Cincinnati. He was hired as a reporter at WKRC radio. Bosco knew that it was unusual to be hired in such a large market right out of college.

“It’s the professional level experience we got every day at WOUB that made all the difference,” said Bosco. “These broadcasts went out over the air every day for the public to listen to and it raised your game. You knew there were regular people listening to this, so we had to make sure we were professional, had the facts right and that our stories were interesting. It was real world experience. I had no qualms about putting WOUB on my resumé when I graduated. WOUB is the real thing. It puts you at an advantage in your first job.”

However, Bosco’s first job after graduation in Cincinnati only lasted three months. The station was sold and everyone was laid off. But Bosco didn’t let that experience keep him down. He went on to work in radio and television in several Ohio cities before landing at ABC 6/Fox 28 in Columbus in the fall of 2007. Bosco is now a multi-media journalist and weekend morning anchor at the station.

“Journalism is what I always wanted to do,” said Bosco. “After 32 years in the business, I’m still fortunate to be doing it.”

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