Photojournalism Story

At the age of 27, Julio Cortez has many accomplishments including winning awards for writing, photography, lay out and advertising. Recently, Julio has been enjoying a string of good luck by being chosen to take part of important internships. He is one of 22 students across the nation to be chosen to The Associated Press summer internship program. The acceptance into such prestigious program would not have been possible if Julio did not get key endorsements, including the full support from the National Association of Hispanic Journalists. Julio will be spending 12 weeks this summer in Chicago learning about The APs work style. The internship will close out Julio's educational career, which will go along with his college commencement in May from California State University, Northridge. Other internships include South Florida Sun-Sentinel, San Angelo Standard Times (Texas), Al Dia (Dallas Morning News) and convention student projects for the Society of Professional Journalists (New York 2004 and Las Vegas 2005) and NAHJ (Fort Worth, Texas). Julio is a recipient of the Los Angeles Times Scholarship Fund. Julio's journalism journey began at 12 years old when he enrolled into the Madison Middle School newspaper "The Madison Journal." The journey has taken him through school publications and other publications. Julio began his journalism life as a writer but always had the camera on his side. Often carrying his camera to reporting job. But it wasn't until the events on Sept. 11, 2001 in New York City, when Julio decided that photography would be the way to go. Seeing all the "historical" photos that were published gave Julio the drive to "record history as it happened." Julio's experience is very diverse working with both photography and writing. He has also taken leading roles as Editor-In-Chief of his school publications. Julio has not had trouble making quality acquaintances as a co-worker, supervisor, mentor and/or apprentice. He is digitally equipped to hand out an assignment from anywhere on a tight deadline. Working under stress is perhaps Julio's zone and he is always looking for the next journalistic adventure.