By Piper Cherry
Candace Buckner is a columnist for Washington Post Sports. After a long journey in journalism, Candace made it to the peak – getting to write stories with any topic under sports she pleased for the Washington Post daily. Although, journalism was not her initial choice of career path. Candance had been studying broadcast journalism for three years at University of Missouri, where she later graduated from in 2002.
In an interview she explained that while growing up, she played sports all through highschool and had always loved basketball. She loved sports and thought they were fun, so she followed her passion into sports. Her dream had always been to be on television – whether it was as a sideline reporter for NBC or working at ESPN. But during the summer before her senior year of college, she took up an internship at a newspaper and instantly knew that was the route for her. She changed courses shortly afterwards and while it wasn’t what she had wanted to do growing up, she’s glad she went down the writing route.
According to the Washington Post, Candace had begun writing for the Post as a beat reporter for the Washington Wizards in 2016. As a beat reporter, she had to solely focus on her team and letting readers know what’s going on with them. It didn’t allow her to implement her voice into her writing pieces, as you are supposed to remain a neutral reporter and tell it like it is. Which is why she enjoys being a columnist as much as she does. She can include her own thoughts and opinions, whether people agree with her or not. And funnily enough, being a columnist was not her end goal. She had wanted to be a features writer, which was what she was before her promotion. As she mentioned in an interview, “I had already achieved my goal. Now, everything is just gravy.”
Candace had explained that life had not always been so easy for her in the journalism world. At one point, she was out of business in her 30s and was working at a Macy’s shoe department. She said in the same interview that, “everybody’s journey is different. It’s a silly game to ever compare yourself to anyone else and as long as you’re doing what you love, you’re on the right track.” She knew that journalism was what she wanted to do with her life, and every stop along the way just developed her passion for it more and more.
Being a woman that is involved in sports in any way can be extremely difficult. Being able to get involved in the first place is also extremely challenging in itself. There have been many situations where women are refused a job solely because they are a woman. There are also many times where women are completely disrespected by coaches, players, and even their own bosses or coworkers simply because they believe women are “less than them”.
Thankfully, the world is progressing in a way that these terrible experiences are lessening day by day. Candace, a Black woman, has had a fairly positive experience throughout her career. She’s never had any problems in locker rooms that some women before her had. As more and more women are included in sports media, the more open minded people become. The person who replaced Candace on the Washington Wizards beat was a Black woman, which in itself is rare. As the years progress, Candace is hopeful that more women and more women of colour will be included into the wonderful world that is sports.
Sources:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/pr/2021/09/24/candace-buckner-named-columnist-washington-post-sports/