The National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) is a nonprofit organization that advocates for Black journalists worldwide. According to its website, it was founded in 1975 by 44 men and women during a meeting in Washington D.C. Since that meeting, NABJ has expanded to over 4,000 members including emerging, professional, and student journalists and educators.
Several student journalists and educators are a part of Georgia State University’s (GSU) NABJ chapter. The chapter’s Instagram describes it as “A strong union of minority students pursuing degrees in journalism, film, and public relations!”
Skyler Hill, the current president of the NABJ GSU chapter, transferred to Georgia State during his sophomore year. He was looking for clubs to get involved in earlier during the COVID-19 Pandemic and decided to start attending the in-person meetings once they started again.
“To tell you the truth, I was really nervous,” said Hill. It was one of the first clubs I was really going to try and be a part of at GSU and I knew people here already, but not too many. And when I joined, I was like, okay, cool. This seems like a really cool club.”
During his junior year, Hill decided to take journalism more seriously and ran for the president position. He talked to the former president, Tyrik Wynn about running.
“E-board elections came around in April of 2022 and I decided I wanted to run for the president role,” said Hill. It’s something that I really looked forward to getting. The results came back about a couple of hours later after we all ran, and I was told that I’d be president for the 2022-2023 year.”
Last Tuesday, Hill along with the other e-board members Kayla Anthony, Amar Shivers, Jaquelin (Jackie) Renà Kent, Kim Ford, and Kenya Oliver hosted a General Body Meeting to which all Georgia State students were invited. The room was filled with students and educators who got the chance to meet the e-board members and get a preview of upcoming events and workshops for the chapter.
There are several upcoming events for the spring 2023 semester, including guest speaker events featuring Cecil Hannibal and Jeremy Jones, internship and interviewing workshops, and a tour of the iHeartMedia office.
Skyler and his fellow E-board members encourage students at Georgia State to join NABJ and connect with its members.
“I just want people to know,” said Hill. “I really want to continue to spread popularity. And you know, it’s been around for decades. NABJ itself has been around for so long. So, I just feel like students at GSU should take advantage of all the clubs and tools that are provided to us by the school. It’s a great organization to be a part of. We invite everyone to come join, attend, and just learn about what we do on campus and the opportunities that we provide.”