In advance of the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games in September, more than 400 athletes will compete for a chance to represent Team USA during the 2016 U.S. Paralympic Team Trials June 30 to July 2 in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Three College of Communications students will also be on site, working hard and preparing for their own trip to Rio.
Through the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism, Antonella Crescimbeni, Allison Gasparetti and Shannon Ryan will be traveling to the trials to cover the events for The Associated Press. The trials will feature cycling, swimming and track and field.
“I think it’s amazing. I never even expected this to even happen. When I first heard about it, I couldn’t even believe it,” Crescimbeni said. “I think it’s an amazing opportunity that I’ve been granted.”
The three students, along with six classmates and faculty members including John Affleck, director of the Curley Center and Knight Chair for Sports Journalism and Society, and Dean Marie Hardin of the College of Communications stayed on campus during the week after spring commencement to prepare for the opportunity. Their work included Skype interviews with athletes and experts from around the country, as well as discussions about Paralympic sports, including a session on the classification system for athletes.
Students covering the trials will focus on storytelling through various platforms, including photo, print and video. The Penn State students will be joined by three students from Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Georgia, which is partnered with the Curley Center in providing coverage of the trial and the Paralympics for the AP.
While the students feel they are well-prepared to cover the trials, this assignment will help get them ready for the main event in Rio, which runs from Sept. 7 to 18.
“Not only will it help us to form connections with athletes,” said Gasparetti, “but it will also give us a sense of how Paralympic games are run and organized.”
According to Ryan, who has volunteered with Penn State Ability Athletics during her college career, helping with media relations and communications, the students are also looking to offer a new perspective on the coverage of Paralympic sports.
“First and foremost, I think that we’re excited to cover these people as athletes,” said Ryan. “You get so many super-cliché inspiration stories, and don’t get me wrong, all of these people are inspirations, but sometimes you get more of a focus on their disability than their actual athleticism. I think that’s a dynamic that we’re looking forward to changing.”
Founded in 2003 and later named for the first editor of USA Today, the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism explores issues and trends in sports journalism through instruction, outreach, programming and research. The Curley Center’s undergraduate curricular emphasis includes courses in sports writing, sports broadcasting and sports information, as well as classes that examine sports’ place in culture and sports as a business.
Students in the Curley Center get an abundance of hands-on opportunities. The combination of the Penn State College of Communications, one of the largest programs of its kind in the United States, and the 31 sports of Penn State Intercollegiate Athletics provides fertile territory for aspiring sports journalists.
What the Curley Center regularly offers often goes far beyond campus, too. Students have covered the Croke Park Classic, NASCAR, the Final Four, the Olympics, the Super Bowl and the U.S. Open in recent years. During the Fall 2015 semester, Curley Center students chronicled the historic trip by the Penn State baseball team to Cuba.