Jean Gonzalez

About

It has been three decades since I first saw my name in print as the author of an article. I truly hope I have improved since then, and I think I have. I will never forget the laughing fit my editor had when she read a lede on a story about a local band — Lakeland has a Fever. Sure, the band's name was Fever, but my editor thought of "hilarious" (her words) subheads, such as "Shot of penicillin needed stat!" and "That's what happens when Lakeland doesn't washes its hands." The vast majority of my professional experience has been at the Florida Catholic Media. When I was first hired in 1994, it was called The Florida Catholic newspaper, and later it evolved in a multi-media outlet that produces more elements than a newspaper and covers more platforms than just a print edition. I'm proud of my involvement in that evolution, especially as so many other outlets have closed, particularly during and post-COVID. Despite staying at one place, I have honed skills and learned new ones. I have extensive experience in editing, reporting, interviewing, photography, layout and design both on the page and for the web, and writing of features, personality profiles, breaking news and investigative journalism. Other experience includes filming and editing videos, and creating and analyzing posts to social media. My specialties are reporting on variety subjects, including politics, death of a loved one, farmworker and farming issues, faith and religion, family life, death penalty and issues and agencies that assist the vulnerable, the undocumented and the underserved. My "professional mission" is to write in a fashion that fosters dignity and respect about the subject matter at hand.I also write fiction for fun, that include suspense pieces and humor — in my humble opinion, even better humor than the subheads written by that former editor.