Thomas Johnson alum is budding documentarian

Andrew Smith, a recent University of Maryland graduate and budding broadcast journalist, was in Jordan this summer when President Barack Obama delivered his much anticipated speech on U.S.-Middle East and Muslim relations.

Smith, one of 10 U.S. college journalists invited to Jordan for a nine-day introduction to the country and its culture, did not, however, see the historic speech.

"We were kind of out in the desert, near the ruins of Petra," he said. "There were no televisions. But the communications director of Jordan's government was with us and because of her position, she'd received a copy of the speech. She read to us, inserting her own commentary as she went along, which I thought was great."

Smith, 21, has also reported from Iceland, where he produced a segment on a hydro-electric dam featured on The Washington Post's website. He works as weekend production assistant at WUSA-TV, a CBS affiliate in Washington.

He is shopping a 30-minute documentary, "Street Sense," to PBS and to the TriMedia Film Festival in Fort Collins, Colo. He filmed it as a student last year.

Street Sense is a nonprofit bi-weekly Washington newspaper founded in 2003 to raise awareness about local homelessness and poverty issues. It is a mix of news, features, editorials, poems and art about homelessness and poverty, contributed by homeless or formerly homeless people, advocates and professional writers interested in social issues.

According to StreetSense.org, about 60 homeless vendors sell the $1 newspaper, which has a circulation of about 12,000 in and around Washington.

"That was a terrific experience," Smith said. "To make a documentary has been my goal, and for me personally to get to know the homeless guys was amazing. I just had lunch with one of the guys, and we spent two hours talking about politics, Michael Jackson, current events.

"This sounds cheesy -- but they're people, too, with their own stories and they shouldn't be ignored just because they're out on the street."

Along with his job at WUSA, the 2005 Gov. Thomas Johnson High School graduate is working this summer in News21, a national fellowship program funded by the Carnegie Foundation and Knight Foundation.

His team, based at the University of Maryland, is putting together multimedia stories about how changing demographics, specifically mixed-race identification, affect national politics. The project will include video, photographs, slide shows with audio, graphics and interviews.

"The idea is to merge a summer-long reporting project and use the web to tell stories in innovative ways," Smith said.

When his fellowship ends next month he plans to look for a full-time job in broadcast journalism, preferably one that will allow him to pursue his long-form journalism and documentary career dreams.

"I'd love to work for the Discovery Channel or National Geographic, that would be ideal," he said.

"What I like about (long-form journalism) is that you get to tell the whole story and get involved in the details," he said. "And the breadth of topics is so wide; it can be about tobacco or the war in Iraq or the environment.

"I really like learning about different things in life -- that's what draws me into it. And to understand what people go through in life, good or bad."

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