A tale of three journalists

What three former and current Buffalo News reporters have in common, and where they differ

In the ever-evolving landscape of journalism, each reporter's journey into and through newspaper outlets can vary wildly, oftentimes reflecting their personal values and identities.

Two former Buffalo News reporters, Daniel Kirchberger and Ellen Przepasniak, and current employee Ben Tsujimoto told their stories experiencing the rise of social media, personal struggles, and the changing dynamics of the newsroom to a UB journalism class.

Przepasniak described entering college as an english major at SUNY Broome, and eventually finding that she particularly enjoyed reading, writing papers, and communicating information.

“I started working at the campus newspaper and I found, hey, this is my thing. Because this fits my skill set, I'm interested in it, there's always something new to it, and even on a campus newspaper and in a larger news organization of any kind, you can always find a way to make a difference, educate people, change something, etcetera. So that's a wonderful perk of all of our jobs. And it doesn't matter what role you're in, in a newsroom or a news organization. You're all going towards the common goal of truth.”

Tsujimoto ended up at the Buffalo News when he ended up working overnight shifts at Tops following his graduation. He was a history major with aspirations to one day work for sports center. But when reality came to be he found a small role as an unpaid intern and inched his way up to a beat reporter for Buffalos public school system.

Though Kirchberger would eventually put his informatics degree to use in data journalism, his first part-time journalism job was as a sports reporter. Once there he found journalism exposed him to people and scenarios that he wouldn’t have experienced in other jobs.

“It really was something different every day,” said Kirchberger. “I was interviewing people on the east side and I was covering the bills on Wednesday afternoon and then I was stumbling down a hill somewhere else. I was in all sorts of different situations that I would not expect to be and oftentimes waking up in the morning having no idea what I would be doing that day and I found that to be very exciting.”

As he grew into the role he also found inspiration in his ability to enact change and communicate to a large audience.

Simultaneously however he didn’t often feel accepted as a journalist in his role doing online interactives, data journalism, and using online tools because in the eyes of others he wasn’t writing the stories themselves.

In her time as a Buffalo journalist Przepasniak found that she had to be delicate in her discussions due to the interconnectedness of the city's social circles.

“Word gets around and people talk to each other or know each other,” said Przepasniak. “People who’re married to each other that you wouldn't know are married. If you're interviewing somebody or you're trying to get Information about somebody you might have somebody's cousin in front of you.”

This also held true out of college at her first newspaper job in Jamestown.

“I went up to somebody in The Newsroom and I said, ‘why did this person do that? Like what a clown.’ And the City Councilman was the editor's cousin,” said Przepasniak.

Kirchberger and Tsujimoto faced quandaries of their own while reporting. Kirchberger hit a roadblock when a local businessman who operated a popular Buffalo chicken wing restaurant passed away — and wished to not be written about in the newspaper. He felt the story was important, but together with the Buffalo News team, decided not to publish it.

Tsujimoto recalled one of his proudest stories about a 6th boy who died by suicide.

“He was taken care of by his grandmother and her grandson was bullied,” said Tsujimoto. “So this bullying led to his his suicide. The grandmother thought it was so important to speak out through the grief. Then a week or so after the suicide, she said ‘I got to speak out about bullying. We can't have this happen to another parent or caretaker's kid.”

This story was covered in his capacity as a school reporter, which often isn’t a walk in the park.

“You don't so much like it all the time because unfortunately, urban education in Buffalo is sort of turned into the youth violence beat, which is not something that's a lot of fun,” said Tsujimoto.

He said urban education was tough to cover due to the large, diverse, and historically underfunded district. Though the school board conflicts and in-school violence keep him busy, he’d much prefer to cover soccer if it was a viable option.

Other issues unique to journalism include the rise of AI, and workplace diversity.

“I'm on a data team specifically,” said Kirchberger. “So there's a bunch of data analysts and as soon as generative AI came out we were like ‘well, our jobs are done.”

However he quickly found that instead of replacing his job, it made him exponentially better at it, and acts as a personal assistant that makes his life more efficient.

Kirchbergers current job as a data analyst at the Philadelphia Inquirer is part of what Kirchberger said is a diverse workforce.

“They have a vice president for that specific role to increase the diversity throughout the company and in the Newsroom,” said Kirchberger. “You get both diversity that's representative of the people that you're covering and if you do that, you have better stories for the community that you're covering at large down not just your specific subscriber.”

Does the Buffalo news foster the same diversity? Not so much, said Tsujimoto.

But it’s getting better according to him, especially in the time after the racially motivated Tops mass shooting.

“We needed to do a better job of reaching communities of color, and before that the Buffalo News had not been very good at it at all really,” said Tsujimoto. “The things that we wrote about certain neighborhoods on the East side of Buffalo were mostly crime related. We were missing a lot of the good things and the human element and the struggles that different communities there were facing.”

Przepasniak experienced much of the same homogeny in her journalism come-up.

“My very first job in Jamestown, NY, I worked with all white people and mostly men and then coming to the Buffalo news and working with a lot more white men, it wasn't easy. I felt out of place,” said Przepasniak.

Both Przepasniak and Tsujimoto had faced stories which were difficult to cover. Sometimes the stories came home with them.

“It can definitely affect you personally and a lot of times I think you're running on adrenaline,” said Przepasniak “You're just saying ‘well, let's get the story, let's cover it.’ But then it can affect you afterward.”

Tsujimoto felt the story follow him home after the Tops mass shooting.

“That one was really hard because you felt the community kind of grieved, and then you saw the aftermath of it and you saw the pain,” said Tsujimoto. “You talked to people who lost family members and you really kind of got the kind of the emotion that kind of tears a little bit and it was hard to not experience that.”

But for now he faithfully continues reporting at the Buffalo News, whereas Przepasniak and Kerchberger have moved out of journalism into other fields.