My name is Emilyn Mohebbi and I am a freelance journalist in San Diego, California.
My professional experience includes work at KPBS as a news producer for different multimedia platforms. My most recent role was producer and fill-in host of KPBS’ daily news podcast, San Diego News Now. Before that, I was a freelance news producer for KPBS Midday Edition, and the assistant news producer (Penner Fellow) for KPBS Evening Edition. My other professional experience includes work at NBC 7 San Diego as a story producer, and a newsroom shadow at BBC World News. News, writing and public speaking are three of my passions. Growing up, I always knew I wanted a career in the news industry, because I love storytelling. News is to inform, and I love being able to be an informative source to my community, to keep everyone up to date on what is going on around us. Born and raised in San Diego, CA, I’ve learned so much about my hometown over the years. There’s so much to share with San Diegans, and I feel blessed to be able to do so through my career.
Education
I graduated from San Diego State University with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Journalism, in December 2019. I chose journalism as my major to fulfill my career goal of becoming a news producer and reporter, covering local news.
Since I graduated from SDSU, I have taken an online course through Harvard University’s online program, HarvardX. The course that I completed was offered by Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, called “Citizen Politics in America: Public Opinion, Elections, Interest Groups, and the Media.” I received a verified certificate of completion.
Experience
My extensive knowledge and opportunities in both public media and commercial TV news have broadened my experiences as a journalist. My portfolio includes work in multiple television news departments, digital departments, such as web production and social media, podcasting and radio news.
In my last role as the San Diego News Now Podcast Producer, I put together the newsroom’s daily podcast, presenting listeners with a unique, easy-to-listen podcast that informs them of the day’s most important stories in a concise way. My main duties included stacking the podcast rundown, selecting top headlines, writing scripts, editing all audio elements together and publishing the podcast online. I also filled in as the podcast host, and pitched, booked, wrote and produced two-way segments. Other than my daily duties, on occasion I’d produce and voice radio spots, which were featured on KPBS radio shows Morning Edition and All Things Considered. During my time in this role, I produced 600+ podcast episodes and hosted 30+ episodes.
As a former freelance producer for KPBS Midday Edition, my daily duties included pitching segment ideas, writing daily web stories, coordinating and conducting interviews with guests, and producing/editing audio segments. I also would line produce the Midday Edition shows weekly. I produced multiple specials, including a Thanksgiving Special, “Turkey Talk,” “Pandemic Stories,” and a three-part special series, “Pandemic in the Arts.” Aside from my Midday Edition role, I was the presenter of the KPBS morning newsroom meetings, where I’d inform the newsroom of assignments on the board each day.
As the former assistant news producer (Penner Fellow) at KPBS, I pitched story ideas, edited videos and wrote stories, all for the weekday Evening Edition newscasts. I edited reporter packages and embedded reporter videos onto KPBS’ digital platforms. I also produced a story package during a special series, “Pandemic Life: One Year On,” where I gathered viewers responses through the KPBS website, and reached out to them to get their story for the package.
As a former story producer at NBC 7 San Diego, I also pitched story ideas, wrote stories for television news, edited videos, stacked shows, and produced shorter newscasts called “cut-ins.” As the producer of “cut-ins,” I chose what local stories were newsworthy, the order I wanted them aired– giving the show a flow that makes sense to viewers, and boothed the shows by cueing the anchors, meteorologists and traffic reporters based on the live network timing. I also got to use my news judgment to choose newsworthy content for the NBC weekend morning shows. Some other opportunities that I had at NBC 7 San Diego, were having my stories published online as digital articles, and having my story ideas broadcasted during multiple newscasts. I was hired as the News and Digital intern at NBC 7 San Diego during my final semester at SDSU. After interning at NBC 7 San Diego for a month, that’s when I was hired as a part-time story producer.
Another experience that I had during college was shadowing the Languages department at BBC World News in London, England. I got to shadow the department that gathers news content from other countries. While in London for my BBC trip, I also took a one-day on-air training course at London’s Three Mills Studios. There I learned about script writing, directing, being an on-air talent and editing video footage.
I have also volunteered countless hours at KPBS (prior to my full-time positions), where I had the opportunity to assist in answering donor phone calls on the set of live television and radio fundraising broadcasts.
I also have experience in the social media and digital field. I previously was a social community manager for Skylum Software, a photo-editing software company for Apple products. I would create content for their social media platforms and website, run promotions and contests online, write daily blogs and engage with clients to maximize exposure. I was also featured in some of the company’s YouTube product tutorials, and I was the face of one of the company’s apps., called “Noiseless.”
Favorite Quote
One of my favorite quotes is, “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken,” by Oscar Wilde. I love this quote because it emphasizes the importance of being yourself. This quote represents my personality and work in the journalism industry, because along with myself, every journalist has their own unique way of storytelling.
“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”
-Oscar Wilde
