Sylvia Gómez pioneer of environmental journalism before the cameras

Life can take you down mysterious paths that turn into purposes. The veteran journalist can attest to this philosophy Sylvia Gomez, who discovered his passion in journalism without intending to and it is where he has built a solid career for more than four decades.

The reporter from Telemundo news met the medium of television 50 years ago, 47 of these dedicated to television journalism.

For his five-decade career on television, Precisely, the reporter will receive the Silver Circle EMMY award on June 12 of this year for her work in the media. This year, the also television reporter, Luz Nereida Velez de Wapa Televisión receives the prestigious distinction that recognizes professionals in the television industry in Florida, Louisiana, Alabama-Pensacola and Puerto Rico who have worked in the medium for more than 25 years.

For Gómez it is an honor and pride to receive the award that validates that his choice for the path of journalism, even when he longed to dedicate himself to the theater, was correct.

https://www.telemundopr.com/local/un-momento-especial-telenoticias-celebra-prestigioso-reconocimiento-a-sylvia-gomez/2319213/

The journalist completed a baccalaureate with two concentrations in drama and English literature. Once she graduated, her dream was to develop as an actress. In fact, she did several plays, participated in soap operas and entered the production area as an assistant. She came to television in 1972 in charge of the animation of a program on WIPR, channel 6.

In that same decade, he applied to the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan for a master’s degree in English Literature in the United States and while studying took several radio and television courses that included documentary production and preparation. At that time, her aspiration was to develop as an actress and literature teacher.

His newsreel debut

“I wanted to continue doing theater. It is very hard to live from the theater. I went to do my master’s degree and I thought about doing a doctorate, because I thought I could be an English literature teacher. So I saw those courses on radio, television there and I took them. They were documentary preparation courses and that fascinated me. I went crazy with it, ”the journalist recalled about her steps in the 1970s.

Gomez explained that by taking the courses at the University of Michigan he was able to “do everything for news and television.” He knew the roles of a director, producer, cameraman, reporter and newscaster.

In fact, it was in those university courses that he experienced discrimination for the first time, because of his Latin accent. In other incidents throughout her career as a television journalist, she has been the object of discrimination in the workplace when she was removed in the 1990s from the position of news anchor and today, along with other colleagues from Telemundo, she sued the employer for wage inequity and gender discrimination. The case is seen in federal court.

“Everywhere there is discrimination. When we did the practice as an anchor and that kind of thing, the students made comments that were a little bit out of place. The comments were because she was a Latin woman and because she had a bit of an accent. They said she wasn’t cut out for that. I remember that the teacher got upset and called their attention. He told them: ‘Let me tell you one thing about all the people who are in this class right now, the only person who has a chance to stand out in television news is her,” recalled the communicator who once arrived in Puerto Rico was quoted by Carmen Junco, pioneer in the direction of WKBM-TV Channel 11as a general manager to audition her live as a reporter.

It was 1975 and the communicator debuted in front of the cameras of Channel 11 as a reporter and later as a female news anchor. She was on Channel 11 until 1979 and then went to the News Department of Wapa Television and spent a year, since Telemundo recruited her in 1980 as a reporter and anchor woman for Telenoticias on WKAQ-TV Channel 2. She was a news anchor until in 1994, then Ivonne Soya replaced her and from that time to the present she works as a reporter on Channel 2.

She shared roles as a news anchor with the late journalist and anchor man, Aníbal González Irizarry, whom he considers the role model in television journalism in Puerto Rico.

“I took an immense love for this profession. Carmen Junco was very good, she was extraordinary. She gave me many opportunities that I am infinitely grateful for. She let me do interviews of all kinds. I did investigative stuff, documentaries. I remember that I made a documentary about rape and went into prisons to interview rapists. At that time I was a girl, because she allowed me to do all that. This career has been extraordinary from the beginning, ”said the communicator who has won three Emmy awards from the Suncoast Chapter.

When reviewing the satisfactions of his career as a journalist, he highlights being able to specialize in environmental issues and be a source of information to educate and protect the planet. Through her work, she advanced solutions journalism by presenting for 21 years the section dedicated to environmental issues in the Channel 2 news program. She was the first Puerto Rican television reporter to do an extensive series of reports on the environmental problems of our communities. coasts and seas. As a result of this work, the communicator was included in the Who’s Who Environmental Registry.

“I am fascinated by doing more extensive works, more than a newspaper report. I like documentaries and thank God throughout my career I have had the opportunity to do it several times. What I am passionate about are environmental issues. I’m not doing it much right now, but it’s what I like. I understand environmental coverage is very important for the country because you can educate and create awareness. You denounce things that are being done incorrectly and expose solutions. It is sorely lacking,” summed up the reporter who paved the way for environmental journalism on Puerto Rican television.

Gómez proudly recounts how he sat in the past at the Telenoticias editorial table to propose reports that covered environmental issues. She has defended her views many times on why this type of coverage was important in the news format, and she is grateful to stand her ground. The reporter regrets that with budget limitations, a section dedicated to environmental issues cannot be developed as before, but whenever her agenda allows it, she tries to present a related story.

The reporter has always tried to remain eloquent, upright, and with the courage required to report news in front of the cameras. The only time she remembers being moved by her feelings in the middle of a live broadcast was with one of the oil spills that occurred in the coastal waters of San Juan that painted the Atlantic Ocean black.

“I felt the oil fumes. I felt like I was drowning. I got a lump in my throat and was barely able to speak on the live report. She couldn’t speak and by the end of the report she was dizzy. I was very affected by the environmental disaster, ”she maintained.

She is still very productive and without thinking about retirement

Retirement It is not news that Gómez contemplates immediately. She assured that she felt productive and eager to continue discovering why she is so passionate about journalism.

When retirement comes, he aspires to return to things that he stopped, such as painting again and studying music.

The newscaster was also She is a professor at the School of Communications at the University of Puerto Rico, so she does not discourage new generations from studying the profession. Of course, she clarified that she emphasizes that not everything is in front of cameras, because she is “very much needed, editors, producers and cameramen.”

She assured that being a woman has never limited her in daily news coverage and that she would love to see more women in the field of communications in different roles.

At first you talked about discrimination, being a student. You have been a victim of it throughout time, here on the canal. Is there currently an active case on a lawsuit for equal pay and gender discrimination?asked The New Day.

“Well, that’s correct, but I can’t speak. That is something that is in the hands of the lawyers at this time,” the reporter pointed out.

In the federal forum, the demands are seen separately from the reporters Gómez, Charito Fraticelli and Ivette Sosa to the channel for gender discrimination and equal pay for work.

–