DePaul's promotional video for our 2010 Olympic experience

DePaul University did a promotional video for the work that we did in Vancouver. Take a look:

"A group of seven DePaul University College of Communication students and alumnae from Chicago discuss the rare and rewarding opportunity they earned to work in the U.S. Olympic Committees press office during the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver."

Blogging from Vancouver during the 2010 Winter Olympics

I leave in just a few days to depart to Vancouver to work with the United States Olympic Committee during the 2010 Winter Olympics. I've had so much work to do and things to organize (for six other people including everything for myself) that it's been hard to take a step back and soak it all in. I think once I get into Vancouver, it will hit me. I think.

In addition to overseeing our staff, I'm also in charge of content and production for the USA Daily Newsletter, a publication that is a preview for the next day's events including information about American athletes. The newsletter goes out to hundreds of media organizations! It's going to be a lot of work, but I think it will be rewarding and a lot of fun.

I'm also blogging about my experience for Chicago Now, The View From Vancouver. You can also follow us on Facebook (View From Vancouver) and Twitter (@vanocview).

I've always wanted to visit the Pacific Northwest, so I'm excited that I'll have some time in Seattle before our train ride to Vancouver. Being from the flat lands of Louisiana, seeing the mountains hasn't lost its novelty. I'll be working at the Main Press Center, which overlooks this beautiful view:

See you in Vancouver!

Countdown to Vancouver..

Lately, I've been thinking about how different my life would be right now if I would have went to the school that was my first choice. I'd be in Gainesville, Fla., right now. Although the University of Florida is a great school (and sometimes when I'm trampling through several inches of snow I think about how nice it'd be to be in Florida..), turning UF down and choosing to come to DePaul turned out to be the right choice. I'm going to the Winter Olympics in Vancouver in less than a month because of it.

I went to a meeting at my professor's office to talk about helping him out with an Olympics Symposium the university was hosting, and he asked me if I wanted to work with the U.S. Olympic Committee during their media summit for the 2010 Games.

Talk about being in the right place at the right time.

It turned out to be a great experience helping the USOC with the USA Daily newsletter. Because of our work there, we were invited to do the same thing in Vancouver for the Olympics! We will be doing a lot more work, but I know it's going to be a great experience. My goal is to work in sports communication/information. Seeing everything come together after all of the hard work that goes into organizing these events is so rewarding. I hope that this experience is a step in the right direction. Maybe even to London in 2012? Never know..

Isn't landing the 2016 Olympics in Chicago supposed to be a big deal? Not to the city's dailies..

With Chicago being one of the four remaining candidates to host the 2016 Olympics, you'd think that Chicago's major daily newspapers would be on top of events relating to the Olympics. Guess again.

The U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) announced that due to the bad economy they are making a 15 percent cut in their workforce to save $7.1 million. The International Herald Tribune also reported that USOC still plans to endorse Chicago for the 2016 summer games.

Since this news could have a huge impact on Chicago's bid, why aren't the Sun-Times or Tribune reporting this story?

There are Associated Press reports from the International Herald Tribune, The Guardian (UK), and ESPN, but there is nothing on either Chicago newspapers' site -- not on the local, national or world news pages at all.

Chicagogames.com, which is run through the Chicago Tribune, had a post today linking to the ESPN report, but this story wasn't posted anywhere on chicagotribune.com, and there isn't even a link to chicagogames.com in the Tribune's list of blogs.

With taxpayers worried about footing the bill and concerns of how Bronzeville residents will be affected with the Olympic village, shouldn't the Tribune and Sun-Times at least be posting the AP reports of the USOC budget cuts?

I hope to see the dailies break down what this means for Chicago in the next day or so, but if they don't feel mentioning it is even important, I wouldn't count on it.

Read my classmates' responses to this post on newsnow.ning.com.