By the time you read this, I’ll be gone, well into a day-long drive with nine other staff members and a couple of advisers.

We are headed for Orlando, Fla., home of the NBA’s Magic, near Tiger Woods’ current or former residence, Universal Studios, and the College Media Advisers convention.

A bunch of our staff members will be attending the convention today through Sunday, along with tons of other student journalists from around the nation. There will also be professional journalists, there to teach and have their brains picked by us interested students.

When we return late Sunday, I hope we bring back a backpack full of knowledge to pass onto our staff to help improve the newspaper.

Last year, that was the case. There is so much to learn at these conferences, especially from the journalists from major news sources like The New York Times, Washington Post, and others.

While there is a lot to learn about the profession from respected journalists, there are also a lot of stories swapped between student journalists about the everyday happenings of the newsroom, TV studio, radio station, etc.

Saturday morning I was hanging out with friends, including a few students at Lake View School of Nursing. The nurses were making some jokes I couldn’t understand, because their nursing vocabulary goes far beyond mine (IV, finger prick). But I enjoyed listening to them even though I couldn’t follow along very well. This is because I knew exactly how they were feeling.

Journalists, like nurses, teachers, and other professionals, have their own dictionary or ways of understanding things. If I told a newsroom joke to somebody who hadn’t experienced what it was like in the newsroom, they wouldn’t laugh. But journalists laugh together about that kind of stuff.

For example, student journalists can come together this weekend and casually joke about that mix-up they had with an interviewee on what time to meet at his or her office, or when that photographer showed up to the wrong event in the student union.

There are also a lot of fascinating stories passed along during casual conversation and during the sessions. Everyone talks about their trials and tribulations as journalists and a lot of lessons are taken from that.

Some of the most interesting stories are the ones told by professional journalists. Last year in Louisville, Ky., I went to a session led by someone from ESPN, who works closely with columnist Bill Simmons. After he ended his spiel, former DEN Opinions Editor Dan Cusack asked him why readers weren’t allowed to comment on Simmons’ articles on ESPN.com. The reason he told us was because Simmons would be so torn apart my harshly critiquing comments that he would feel obligated to respond directly, which would break some ESPN rules. I found it astounding that Simmons, whose books I’ve read, was so sensitive to criticism.

This weekend journalists will invade Orlando like birds going south for the winter. Many jokes will be told, many stories shared, and many lessons learned.

As I sit cramped on a 17-hour car ride, I’ll wonder what interesting story I’ll bring back this time.

Alex McNamee is a junior journalism major.

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