{"id":241,"date":"2026-04-27T16:53:44","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T16:53:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/?p=241"},"modified":"2026-04-27T16:53:47","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T16:53:47","slug":"sport-journal-reflection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/2026\/04\/27\/sport-journal-reflection\/","title":{"rendered":"Sport Journal Reflection"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>In this class, I have been able to expand my knowledge on sports farther than ever before. I pushed myself above and beyond my writing, navigating WordPress, creating a blog, and expanding my network by reaching out to several sports professionals and getting the opportunity to work with one for the semester.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the beginning, I was really nervous about this course. Having a sports penpal seemed daunting, and I was really new to creating a blog, having only worked with simple websites like Carrd in the past. Despite my own nerves, however, I was able to accomplish everything the course required, including writing a sports feature story, completing a capstone project, and writing several blog posts about my favorite sport, football, to name just a few!&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Another lesson this class has taught me is to never underestimate myself. I have doubted myself so many times when it comes to sports, because being a woman in the sports industry can be incredibly discouraging. There have been times where I have worn a Bengals jersey in public and have been asked to \u201cname five players\u201d or if \u201cI actually like my team,\u201d which really got to me. Despite this, I continued loving football and the Bengals no matter what people had to say. My sports penpal, Julia Mendelson, who is a woman in sports, also gave me inspiration to keep moving forward with my dreams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The most important skill that I learned throughout this course was communication. Not just with my penpal, but for the capstone assignment as well. I had wonderful group members who kept great communication for the paper, and I was fortunate to have the opportunity to work with them. The penpal assignments also taught me how to properly budget my time. I learned to reach out early so I could get the information I needed to begin my assignments and submit them on time. This came with some trial and error, however, because there were times where I was caught up in work for other classes and reached out to my penpal later than I should have. I was able to turn it into another learning experience that I can apply to future situations. Sometimes I make mistakes, but I learn from them like anybody else does!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Through and through, I enjoyed this course a lot. Like anything new, it seemed scary at first, but once I made my way through one module at a time, the material clicked and I was able to push my previous limits to succeed. Putting all of the skills I learned together will surely help me to succeed in my future (hopefully in the world of sports media), and I am grateful for everything I have learned in this class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>With appreciation,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Kaleigh Longerbeam<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In this class, I have been able to expand my knowledge on sports farther than ever before. I pushed myself above and beyond my writing, navigating WordPress, creating a blog, and expanding my network by reaching out to several sports professionals and getting the opportunity to work with one for the semester.&nbsp; In the beginning, &hellip; <\/p>\n<p><a class=\"more-link btn\" href=\"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/2026\/04\/27\/sport-journal-reflection\/\">Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32083,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","wds_primary_category":1},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32083"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=241"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":242,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241\/revisions\/242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/kalesportblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}