Story by Jonathan Villagomez

Every year, The Clackamas Print takes a trip to a journalism conference where our writers, photographers and editors get to listen to keynote speakers and go to sessions where many working professional journalists talk about their fields of work to share their knowledge.

This year the conference took place February 27 to 29 in San Francisco, though the Associated Collegiate Press conference is hosted in different cities throughout the year.

Many of the guest speakers were based around the Bay Area. Some of them part of large news publications like the San Francisco Chronicle and others from tech giant Google.

The ACP conference brings together many of the country’s college journalists, with some students and attendees coming as far as British Columbia and Japan.

We had 11 staff members come to San Francisco to take part in this year’s conference. It was a great opportunity to learn from professionals and also from ourselves.

“What a perfect opportunity to connect, engage and learn from my peers. An experience I will not soon forget,” said Nick Schwada, staff writer.

During our off time, we had the opportunity to enjoy the sun and explore all that the city had to offer.  Many of us went to the Golden Gate Bridge, walked the piers to see the seagulls fly and ride scooters across the city at night.

“Highlight of my year! I traveled with friends and grew closer to my journalism family while exploring a beautiful city. I gained some perspective and learned just how easy it is to gain connections in the field. Also the food was delicious and I will be dreaming of that gelato for months,” said Olivia Lynch, staff writer.

Lexis Shull, sports editor, has attended two conferences throughout her time here. “San Francisco was my second journalism conference I’ve actually attended, as I attended one in New York last March with The Print. What I really enjoy most about the conference is getting to meet and listen to highly successful journalists talk about my passions to help me reach those goals in the future. The city was beautiful and lively, and there was always something to do. I feel like I really bonded with my classmates that also attended.”

The Clackamas Print attends these conferences every year as a way to gather new ideas and strategies that we can implement to better serve our community. We want to make sure we offer and deliver the most accurate content to our readers in a way that is easily accessible to all.