HOW LOYOLA SHAPED ME
Team Building Caroline Gonzalez ’17 (communication)
As digital media coordinator for the New Orleans Saints and Pelicans, Gonzalez maintains the website and apps for both teams and has hosted the Saints postgame show as well as co-hosted The Black and Blue Report, a weekly podcast on the two teams. On July 1, 2019, she'll become broadcasting coordinator, working behind the scenes and on-air for both franchises. "First things first, I know this story is about me, but I want to be careful with how much I use the word, 'I,'" Gonzalez says. "I wouldn’t even be close to the position I’m in without my family, the people at Loyola who shaped me, and the people here at the Saints and Pelicans who have gone the extra mile to help me start my professional career." At only 23 years old, Gonzalez is the digital media coordinator for the New Orleans Saints and Pelicans, and on July 1, she'll become broadcasting coordinator. By anyone's standard of success, she's a little bit ahead. But instead of singing her own praises, she's got a list of people she insists on thanking. Many of Loyola's best and brightest have this in common — they're quick to credit others with their success. She mentions Beth Blackburn, her manager; Doug Tatum, her boss; John DeShazier; Daniel Sallerson; Jen Hale; Sean Kelley — all people she feels grateful to have worked with. "Each one of these people and countless others have encouraged me, given me their hand, and built me up when I was at my lowest," she says. It's a humility characteristic of Loyola — the true recognition that one's success is the community's success. That lifting others lifts oneself. And it's not the only Loyola-ism Gonzalez picked up in her time here. As she learned her trade, she learned to love being a student. The diversity of interests on Loyola's campus, plus the university's focus on becoming a well-rounded person, pushed her ambition to its full potential. "Loyola allowed me the opportunity to become the best student I could be . . . the best athlete I could be, and a well-rounded individual with her sights set on her goals." She describes her experience at Loyola as "go, go, go," and learning to balance everything became a crucial skill — one that she's carried into her career. "A 14-hour day isn’t unheard of; it’s pretty common in this industry, but that’s what makes it fun," she says. "The chaos of everything I had going on at Loyola and everything I have going on in my profession is very similar." This ambition is something Gonzalez believes was particularly important for Loyola to foster in her
32
loyno | FALL 2018
because during high school, she prioritized her athletic career over her education. But when Loyola recruited her to play basketball, it was a stroke of fate. Here, she found her passion for higher learning, and more than that, she found the community she needed to encourage her toward becoming a well-rounded scholar and athlete. "At a big school it’s easy to feel like a small fish in a big pond," she says. "If it weren’t for the small pond of Loyola, I wouldn’t have been able to get coffee with my professors and sit in their office and talk about the latest social media trends or have 20-year-old crises." She speaks fondly of professors Laura Jayne and Lisa Collins, both of whom she visited with every day simply to talk — about class, goals, life, anxieties, victories. Those two women became hugely important mentors to Gonzalez. "They instilled confidence in me," Gonzalez says. "And not just confidence as a student to get an A but the confidence to be a successful person, reporter, and woman." Jayne helped Gonzalez pitch stories to Nola.com, and one assignment in her capstone class was for each student to meet with a professional in their field. Jayne connected Gonzalez with a friend of hers. His name — Doug Tatum. "Because of the skills and characteristics that Loyola taught me, like to have a positive attitude with every single assignment no matter big or small, I was able to stand out of the crowd," she says. "I was able to prove to myself and prove to others that I was the person they should be willing to take a risk for." And Gonzalez has more than proven herself. "This past year I was moved into the new broadcasting coordinator position not because they think I’m perfect but because they see potential in me and they have confidence that I’m willing to work hard to get the job done." And what she's most excited about in her new position — "I’m so excited to learn; I think that has been the most fun part of this entire process. Just learning from others. No matter how big or small the opportunity, it’s still an opportunity to learn." In true Loyola fashion, what Gonzalez has become at heart — is a lifelong student.