For one recent graduate of the College of Media & Communication, the tedious work of filling out internships applications paid off. To fulfill the requirement of obtaining an internship for a Texas Tech University broadcast journalism degree, Evan Dixon traveled to Washington, D.C., last summer to work for NBC News.
Evan Dixon poses outside of the Texas Tech University College of Media & Communication.
“The first time I remember watching the news and really remembering the power of it, it was September 11, 2001,” Dixon explained his initial interest in the field, when he had turned on The Today Show as a young child. “My parents had no idea what was going on, until I turned on the TV and told them. And, that was the first time I remember I realized the power of journalism.”
With a laugh, Dixon, now 23, admitted as a child he said he wanted to be Matt Lauer, the news anchor for The Today Show, when he grew up.
As a stepping stone toward this path of journalism, Dixon began an internship with NBC’s “Meet The Press,” a public affairs television program, immediately after finishing his courses last May.
“I literally did, kind of, a little bit of everything, kind of learning about how the whole show works,” Dixon said, describing hours of research the team completed each week as well as gathering video B-roll, graphics and Associated Press photographs.
Upon completing his internship at the end of August 2014, the graduate said he completed the paperwork for his diploma and began working as a desk assistant for NBC News the next week.
“The reason that I got the job when I did is because I was already in the building,” Dixon said, “and I knew a lot of people downstairs at the Bureau.”
Evan Dixon
The Albuquerque, New Mexico, native clarified a desk assistant position is an 18-month program at NBC from which employees learn different roles throughout the course of the year and a half.
“At the end of 18 months, you really kind of understand everything that happens in the Bureau to make a show,” Dixon said. “Just like all of the roles you learn in class.”
Another perk of the job, Dixon described, is working alongside big-names in the business, such as journalists Andrea Mitchell, Pete Williams and Tom Costello.
“They’ll sit down with you and talk about the story they’re working on,” Dixon said, “or they’ll talk to you and give you advice on where you want to be in your career.”
While the Texas Tech alumnus is currently on a fast-track to advancing in his career field, he recalled his first venture in news early in his college career.
Dixon and two other students began The Toilet Times, a monthly one-page list of happenings at the university, that was taped to the back of the door on every bathroom stall in residence halls.
“It was like 8,000 toilets or something like that,” Dixon said, with a reminiscing smile. “So, we figured if we taped the clear things to the back of each door, we could just hand them out to the RA.”
Evan Dixon
While the community advisers could handle replacing The Toilet Times in the stalls, in their respective sections they managed, they were unwilling to tape the clear sleeves to the stalls, when the publication began.
“There’s, like, so many posters and stuff like that in the residence halls, that it was tough to get the word out,” Dixon explained. “I figured there was one place on campus that every student that lives in the residence halls has to go to, and that’s the toilet.”
Aside from The Toilet Times, Dixon participated as a member of Complex Council, a governing student-run management of residence halls, his freshman year, becoming the Wall/Gates Complex president.
“The Complex Council gets $5 from every student that lives in their residence hall to plan events,” Dixon said. “We would do game-watching parties and stuff like that when Texas Tech was playing at OU, just a lot of stuff to make living on campus a little more bearable.”
His sophomore year, Dixon was elected to the Residence Hall Association, which manages all of the Complex Councils. During this period, the student began “Say Hey Week,” allowing everyone who is a part of Complex Council and the Resident Hall Association to socialize with each other and other students. A year later, Dixon became a senator for the Carpenter/Wells Complex.
Apart from his involvement in student housing, Dixon became a member of the Delta Sigma Phi fraternity.
Evan Dixon
“I never expected to be in a fraternity,” he said. “We prided ourselves and still do, I hope, on being a different kind of fraternity on campus. We’re really strong about the brotherhood aspect of it and being friends with everyone that’s in your fraternity.”
Though very involved at the university, after his junior year, he took a year-long break from college to work for a U.S. senate campaign in New Mexico. Following that venture, Dixon worked for then-State Sen. Robert Duncan until the student’s graduation. Duncan now serves as chancellor of the Texas Tech University System.
“I’ve always had an interest in politics,” Dixon said. “That’s really why I wanted to go to Washington because they’ve got the best politics around.”
After his year working on political campaigns, he returned to Texas Tech and met Alicia Keene and Abbie Arroyos in a class, who were then, respectively, the news director and enterprise editor of The Hub@TTU.
“They brought me down here,” Dixon said of The Hub office, “and I lived the rest of my senior year in that corner.”
As an intern for The Hub, Dixon contributed to several award-winning stories, such as “ICYMI: Executive Candidate Forum and Election Coverage,” “ICYMI: The Hub’s Conversation With A Congressman,” and “Asbestos on Campus.”
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