Whenever someone asked me what I wanted to do after high school during my freshman year, I told them I wanted to be a Broadway star. I wanted to star in a musical on Broadway and become the next Lea Michele, Sutton Foster, or Kristen Chenoweth. I wanted to win a Tony Award and see my name in lights.

By the time I was 14 years old, I already had seven years of acting under my belt, between two high school musicals and countless community theater productions. I took singing lessons from two different voice instructors and was in my high school chorus. I always begged my parents to take me to a Broadway show for either my birthday or for Hanukkah. I kept track of all the new Broadway shows coming out and sang along to songs from old shows. The one thing that made me stick out from other theater geeks, though, was that I never watched "Glee." I thought "Glee" was overrated (although a few of the covers were pretty good).

So what made me change my mind and go into broadcasting a mere few years later?

The horror stories. People going to countless auditions and never getting in, and not just Broadway, but Off-Broadway, Off-Off Broadway, Equity and Non-Equity Owned Production Companies as well.

There's that mindset some people will have where you won't settle until you make it on Broadway and then end up waiting tables for the rest of your life or never leaving your hometown.

I could've done that. I could've gone to a college like Purchase or NYU and majored in Theater or Music and risk spending thousands of dollars in tuition and fees only to end up waiting tables for the rest of my life. Countless amounts of people have told me that I was good enough to be a successful singer-actress.

But I chose not to. I chose not to take the risk.

My guidance counselor suggested that I go into a communications-related field and brought up Broadcasting. I thought to myself, "Well, if I can't be an actress, maybe I could be a news anchor."

I thought wrong on that too.

During my first semester of college, I became completely nervous during anchor audition. My eyes fluttered everywhere and I stumbled on a few words here and there. I was usually never nervous. College was a whole new stage with a bunch of new actors. This wasn't a high school audition where everyone got in, regardless of how much they sucked. This was "do or die."

The hardest part about trying to become an anchor when you come from a theater background is that the hardest role you will ever play is yourself. No squeaky voices. No fast paced speed. No accents. It is just your normal, natural self. I was so used to pretending to be someone I'm not that when the moment came where I had to play myself, I completely went blank.

I didn't get picked to be an anchor and scrapped the idea quickly.

Now what?

I wanted to stick with Broadcasting, but there were times where it just didn't want to stick with me. But I was not about to give up hope. After analyzing the different tactics and strategies used by the many directors and producers I've met and became friends with at our campus's television station this past year, I finally came to the conclusion that I wanted to be a producer or director. An Oswego alumni that I met at a panel discussion once told me that it's much easier to find work as a producer than it is for a reporter or anchor. But the work you have to put into as a producer is much harder than you think.

I've learned my lesson the first time I became an assistant producer for one of my friends' shows. I was struggling to think of material and the right words to say without it sounding either lengthy or offensive. Only 20 minutes before the taping did I finish what I had to for my block, and I was one of those people who liked to finish tasks ahead of time.

After that day, I vowed to never make that mistake again and really plan ahead of time.

Now, instead of creating my stage character, I'm creating my own show and getting my team together. I'm coming up with what to do in what block, how we can try and connect with our audience, and how we can promote the show once it's given the green light.

Now, instead of memorizing pages of lines and lyrics, I'm keeping track of every news story that breaks, from Oswego County to New York City; thinking of how to word the story for a newscast.

Now, instead of practicing my choreography, I practice how each broadcast will go in the mirror; when to "Take Program" and VTRC, when to fade to Camera 2, when the bugs, the lower thirds, or the left or right OTSs should appear, and when to "Take Break."

Now, instead of trying to be the actor, I wanted to do what my friends who have either just graduated or are going to be seniors or juniors* have done and be the one running the show.

I could've done theater on the side or minored in music. But, I soon realized that if I focused too much on my minor and not enough on my major, I would've been in deep trouble in the future when it came time to find employment.

Is there still a long and grueling road ahead of me to become a producer or director? Yes. Is it still competitive? Yes. No matter what you go into, whether it's Theater or Biology, you are always going to be faced with competition.

But the one thing that theater, broadcasting, and all the other majors out there have in common is the experience of actually doing it. Going up on stage and belting your heart out to "Defying Gravity" or producing an amazing segment to a show is much more fun than sitting around on your computer watching Netflix all day hoping that someone will come to you and say, "Do you want to star in our show?"

In life, you have to make sacrifices and my sacrifice was my talent for acting and singing in favor of going into something I had little to no experience of in the past. While many of my peers came from big high schools in well known places (Long Island, Buffalo, Syracuse, Rochester, Albany) and several of them with television stations, I came from a small high school in a small, no-name area with no television station; not even one in my area. However, I caught on and learned quickly about the ins and outs of television broadcasting in my little amount of time at WTOP.

Sure, I can still play piano and sing and act on the side from time to time, but it's not something that I wanted to do in life. I didn't want to wait years and years until I finally found something.

And who knows with Broadcasting. I could get a job right out of college or I could be waiting years and years until I got one. But I hope, in my mind, that I am more likely to get a job in something more realistic and just as fun, fast paced and exciting as something that I've grown on for years and have been aware of the realities of.

(*Note: Credit wise, I am going to be a junior this year. I came into college with a whole year's worth of credits, thanks to the AP and college classes I took in high school. But this is technically going to be my second year in college. I am planning to graduate a full year early.)