Sports Writing Jobs for Kids

The idea flashes into a youngster's mind in an instant. He loves sports and he has since he could walk, run and catch a ball. Perhaps his favorite sport is baseball and he dreams of playing in the big leagues. But sometime around 7th or 8th grade, while he may be a good player, perhaps the best of his circle of friends, he is perhaps the 10th best player in his hometown and he is very unlikely to make the big leagues no matter how much he wants it. But he reads the paper every day and realizes that the individual whose name appears over the game story is getting paid to cover baseball. In such moments careers are born. A young person's story gets started with the first story he writes.

  1. Potential

    • Getting that first sportswriting job can be difficult and is quite challenging. The first place to go is the school paper. While a young person may not like dealing with an editor who may be the same age or a year older, there is little choice in the matter. Tell her your story idea and how you plan to execute it. If you get the approval, go ahead and do it. Don't waste time thinking about it. This is your first sportswriting job.

      You may go to every one of your school's football games anyway and know the team as well as anyone. Go to the local paper and ask if you can write a weekly game summary or perhaps a column. By going to the editor, looking her in the eye and putting your proposal out there, you will win high points for gumption at the very least.

    Time Frame

    • Dealing with a deadline can be difficult for even the most veteran writers. However, when you are writing about the results of a game, you have to produce quickly. You may want to create an outstanding impression by coming up with a catchy lead that shows your editor how clever you are. That's nice but it's not nearly as valuable as telling the story of what happened clearly and concisely. Your editor will be far happier with a cleanly written and accurate story than a colorful one that comes in past deadline and may not be accurate. If you are working at a daily newspaper, you may have as little as an hour after the game to get your story in to the editor.

    Function

    • Writing a story or column on deadline is the best way to know if sportswriting really is an ideal career. The idea of it may be great. Who wouldn't want to get paid to watch teams play? But you have to be able to execute your responsibilities and feel good about what you are doing. If you don't enjoy asking questions of a losing coach right after the battle and then writing the story, this may not be the career for you. It's best to get the experience before deciding on this as a career or going in another direction.

    Considerations

    • Coming up with story ideas and then writing the stories is an outstanding way to develop your talent as a writer as a young person. Your editor may provide a great deal of help after you finish your story with valuable criticism and advice, but that editor may just be a year or two older than you and may not know any more than you do. In those cases, you can teach yourself by coming up with ideas, writing stories and then reading them and editing them yourself. Each story you write should be better than the one you did before.

    Misconceptions

    • Sportswriting can be a thrilling and emotionally rewarding career. People often talk about wanting a job that they like to do and sportswriting is usually high on that list. However, with the exception of a few positions, sportswriting is not a lucrative career and few sportswriters can get rich doing what they like. Young sportswriters are better off knowing this before they get started. That way they can go on with their career choice if they don't care about getting rich, or they can choose to go in a different direction.