August 17
When I first moved to the Downtown Phoenix Campus and saw my Today show themed floor I thought, “Oh cute, little posters of coffee mugs and Today show quotes.” Little did I know that those paper cut-outs would bring so much national attention.
August 21
During a floor meeting, Floor 11 fantasized about the Today show recognizing us. We took group photos and shot a video of our floor rocking ASU gear and showing off the floor. The video’s catchphrase was “We are Sun Devils and Today is our day.” Our CA’s Torunn Sinclair and Kari Osep told us to start tweeting #SunDevilsHeartToday. By the end of classes we were told on the Floor 11 Facebook page that our tweets were actually gaining recognition! Doug Meehan and Fay Fredricks, anchors of 12 News Today (the local NBC affiliate), even retweeted us.
August 23
Matt Lauer, anchor on the Today show tweets our CA saying that our floor would make a great news story.
August 27 – 7:45 AM
12 News Today comes to film us for the local Phoenix news show. Anchor Doug Meehan and crew had us pile into the lounge in our sleep-like states. But once the cameras started rolling we quickly forgot about how early it was. Doug asked us trivia questions about the Today show and gave out some Today show swag. Doug’s hilarious personality made it impossible to be nervous. First year first semester Journalism students already making it on local television! We were more than satisfied with our few minutes of fame, but the attention on the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism just kept escalating.
August 30 – 1:51 PM
The Today show posts an article on their website recapping our time on the local show. The interview with our CA’s was typed out in the article and the 12 News Today news package was posted just above the interview.
October 16 – 10:30 PM
Time had gone by and the hype about being on the local show has died down. We got the alert that there was an emergency floor meeting. Very urgent. It was right after the Downtown Homecoming Dance. All I could think was, “Ugh, what did our floor do? What are we about to be yelled at about?” The meeting was short for there was only one life-changing message: we were going to be live on the Today show! A crew from the show was flying in from New York so we could be viewed live.
October 23 – 12:30 AM – The Big Day!
I was lying in bed so tired, so comfortable, and SO ready for bed. But I knew I had to prepare myself to stay up all night. I headed downstairs to go help make posters. When the elevator descended all 11 floors to the ground, I got out and instantly woke right up. There was music blasting! I headed over to the dining hall and saw it flooded with Cronkite students making posters. There was such a community feel to it that I walked right up to new faces and helped out on their posters. 3:30am rolled around, the excitement died down and we were all pretty tired. The supply of Monster energy drinks ran out, many students, including myself, were singing classics to stay awake. That’s when we finally got the call to line up.“Floor 11 line up here! Everyone else, line up along the wall!” Since it was just floor 11 that was Today themed, we got first camera priority while the other Cronkite students were allowed in the back.
Shuffling into Devil’s Den, the once laid-back Taylor Place lounge was transformed into a news studio. Bright lights, tech crews, and equipment cluttered the room. I was one of the few students selected to wear an earpiece. Through the earpiece I heard Savannah Guthrie’s voice live! See, we had to be there at 4 am because we were going to be aired live in New York, and there is quite the time difference. That’s when a little television turned on. I thought it was a teleprompter but it was actually the live show. Our anchor did it completely without a teleprompter!
We were shown cheering for a few seconds every few minutes and there was about a ten minute break between times we would be shown. There had been talk about how it was disappointing that Sparky never showed up, but suddenly, in the middle of our live debut, Sparky walked into Devil’s Den wearing a suit. Our laughs turned to cheers when Sparky removed his head to reveal that Sparky was actually Al Roker. Al Roker is the weatherman and co-anchor on the Today show. He is a big celebrity among Cronkite students. We were told that someone from the show was coming to film us, but never in our wildest dreams did we imagine such a famous name would come to our school to talk to us. Anchors from the Today show could not even communicate with Al because we were cheering so loud. When we calmed down, Al interviewed Torrun and Kari who were almost in tears from the surprise.
During the time between live shots, Al would answer our questions. I was fortunate enough to be the first person he called on to ask a question.
After that, he passed out Today show hats and one girl even got him to sign it! Another surprise was that our new friend, Doug Meehan, also came down to Taylor Place to simultaneously report for the local show. Doug and Al popped back and forth between anchoring on the local show and the national show. It was so cool to see Doug again.
Once the sun started coming up, the exhaustion really began to hit. I was beyond ready for bed but the tech crew kept saying, “Okay just a couple more times! You guys are on again in 8 minutes.” By then students began to leave, but I faithfully stayed until the end. Doug invited us a few blocks over to his studio to be on the local show, but I had no energy left. People talk about how you are going to pull all-nighters in college, but this time it was worth it.