By Ania Felder
Hello local residents, I’m Ania Felder. Some of you might know it from reading it underneath the headlines of my past stories I have written for this Independent paper. Some of you may know it from my own local news platform, NewsWithNia Local Belleville Podcast.
Today, I am going to share my journey instead of everyone else’s.
I am a 21-year-old journalism student who moved from the westside of Detroit around 2008-2009 when I was roughly around 3 or 4 years old and Belleville/ Van Buren Township has been the only true home I have ever known since that transition. I spent years having backyard parties, participating every single summer in our Belleville Area District Library’s summer reading program (these were early signs that I would go into journalism), attending both the Strawberry Festival (which I dearly miss) and Wayne County Fair each summer before returning to school.
Over the past decade I have watched the city transform from a small town into a blossoming community full of new homes, businesses, and educational opportunities.
In 2023, I graduated with honors from Belleville High School. Fast forward three years later and I am becoming the first in my household and generation to earn an associates of arts degree from the Wayne County Community College District. To date, I’ve experienced writing for a local newspaper, starting a new social media platform, becoming a politician’s first ever student research intern, as well as a first generation college graduate between the ages of 19-21.
Some people think I have “it all together” or that things come “naturally” to me.
But that couldn’t be further from the truth. In reality I’m actually a late bloomer.
Growing up as a teenager during COVID, many of Belleville High’s programs we see today were cut completely, so I couldn’t take a journalism course in high school.
Unfortunately this didn’t improve when I began attending WCCCD because there was no journalism program. I was told by one of my counselors that I was the “first” journalism student they ever had.
There’s a lot of pressure that comes with being the “first” at anything because while others have a cheat code to life, you are the one writing that cheat code for future generations to follow, and oftentimes people don’t understand your vision until you have made it your reality.
When I met Michigan state Sen. Sarah Anthony on a field trip recently, the piece of advice she gave my journalism peers and I about being the first at anything was to “always be overly prepared so you don’t have to get prepared.”
For the last three years that has become a biblical verse that I have lived by, because when I began my post-secondary journey I felt “stuck” in my situation. I couldn’t get any internships despite my drive and passion for journalism resulting from a lack of experience in the industry.
My counselors and National Associate of Black Journalists colleagues helped me draw the conclusion that I needed to give myself everything I want out of my life instead of depending on others to do it for me.
This is why I reached out to the Independent and offered to write occasional stories, why I began NewsWithNia reaching out to many of you for interviews despite not being paid for it, and why I applied to intern for our state Rep. Reggie Miller.
Times are changing for my generation, especially during the uncertain future in an expanding digital age. So my advice to anyone my age, younger, or even older would be to find a way to give yourself the opportunities you want and learn how to do as many new hobbies with your current skill set as possible.
As we all witness jobs, opportunities, and even some forms of education becoming more scarce, you have to be the sun, moon, stars, and entire solar system in life. There will be many times where you may feel punished or rewarded for attempting to learn a new skill but you have to at least try.