From Rolling Out:

Emmy Award-winning journalist and NBC News correspondent Mara Schiavocampo is a pioneer in the field of digital reporting. She’s every news reporting agency’s wish for an employee. Here, the wife, expectant mother and self-contained journalist shares how she climbed the ladder to success, why self-sufficiency is crucial in journalism and where she’d love to live outside of the United States. -Yvette Caslin

When did you decide that you were going to be a journalist?

When I was little, I always loved to write. In high school, I was interested in science and medicine and decided I wanted to be a doctor. Then, I went to school for pre-med and took some science classes and realized I had to no talent for science at all. I circled back to my first love, which is writing. I wanted a job that would let me write. I was really interested in current events and travel. I traveled a lot as a kid because my father worked at the World Bank. Journalism was the field that made the most sense to me and combined all of those things.

Tell us about your dual citizenship.

My father is first-generation Italian, and my mother is African American, born and raised in the States. I have dual citizenship through my father. I have very close connections in Italy. I traveled there as a child in the summer, and I grew up in a bilingual household. So, my first languages are English and Italian. Italian is a big part of my cultural identity, even though I grew up here and lived here most of my life.

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