By Audrey Helms | BG Falcon Media intern
Tyler Buchanan ‘13 recently hit an impressive milestone with the BGNews Alumni Society. Buchanan, a Midwest Editor for Axious, has now served two years as President of the organization.
“It’s especially rewarding to be able to help my own alma mater. So it’s kind of just an opportunity to stay connected to the school,” he said.
Buchanan said that the society is composed of people who work in journalism, public relations, communication, print media, digital media, broadcasting, sports, and news.
“We try to really have a wide variety of members, with the goal being that if we’re going to help the wide array of students, their interests, career paths and things that they’re in school for now, we need to be diverse in our own expertise,” Buchanan said. “So part of my job is just recruiting different types of members that can really hit a lot of that.”
Buchanan said the society has a large presence at Homecoming and the annual School of Media and Communication Award Ceremony Night. Additionally, members provide mentorship to current BG News students and coordinate classroom visits.
Buchanan shared the mentorship that BGNAS members provide to current students is important as he “distinctly remembers having specific mentors,” he said, “I just really had a desire to help out the next generation of journalism students, and I felt like I got a lot of help when I was there.”
He continued, “you can’t really overstate how important it is to have this network of alumni to try to help in any way that we can.”
In addition to mentorships between BGNAS members and student journalists, Buchanan said that two of his favorite events to attend are classroom talks and Homecoming weekend. He said Homecoming is a “great opportunity to be able to meet with fellow alums” in addition to being able to “connect with current students and hear some of the internships that they’ve had or that they’re pursuing.”