Every Wednesday last semester, Jonathan Gneiser walked to Hibbard Humanities Hall, where UW-Eau Claire's student newspaper, The Spectator, is located. 

On Wednesdays, Gneiser worked for around 10 hours to put together the next day's edition of The Spectator. For most of this time, he would sit in front of the computer and lay out the front page pictures and stories. 

Around 6p.m., he and other Spectator staffers ordered pizza and ate while working. There wasn't enough time to take a supper break.

"Those were long and time-consuming nights," Gneiser said. 

The deadline was 9:30 p.m. but many nights he stayed at The Spectator office until midnight because stories  were not ready or because of a computer breakdown.  

At midnight he drove to the Leader-Telegram, where The Spectator is printed, to drop off the disks that contained the next issue. Last semester, Gneiser worked at The Spectator about  40 hours a week.

"I spent more time working at The Spectator than I did doing my schoolwork," Gneiser said. 

In his fifth grade creative writing class, Gneiser discovered his passion.  "Ever since fifth grade, I've looked into writing as a career," Gneiser said. He enjoys creating stories and putting words together to entertain and educate people. He went into journalism because he likes being creative and also enjoys finding out what's going on. "I want to let people know, as much as I can, what they want to know about what's going on ," Gneiser said. He also said it's important for people to learn things that are not as appealing, but are pertinent for them to know. 

He started writing for newspapers when he got to high school. In Berlin High School, Gneiser was first a reporter. Later he became a photography editor and editor-in-chief. 

Gneiser started as a reporter for The Spectator in fall 1998. Later that fall Gneiser became a news editor. The following semester he was copy editor. Gneiser has also been staff writer, editorial editor, managing editor and editor-in-chief. This fall Gneiser is The Spectator’s online editor and graphics editor.  

During the summer Gneiser had an internship with the Menomonie bureau of the Leader-Telegram. He was writing stories assigned by his news editor as well as completing story ideas that he found himself.

When Gneiser stared at UW-Eau Claire, he wasn't sure what area of communication he was going to go into but knew for sure he wanted to work at the newspaper. Gneiser is a print journalism senior.  His minor is Web graphic design. For a while he thought he might go into public relations or broadcasting. "The longer I spent at The Spectator, the more I knew I wanted to go into print journalism," he said.

Gneiser will be graduating this coming May. He hopes to find a job in a daily newspaper in the Midwest area as a general assignment reporter. He said,  “I want to write because it's what I know how to do.” 

Gneiser has higher ambitions. He said eventually he hopes to have a national syndicated column like Dave Barry. "I like to make people think through humor rather than a regular news story," Gneiser said. Also Gneiser’s goal is to work in an important position at a national newspaper. He said, “I would like to work my way up to a newspaper like The New York Times or The Washington Post.”