Anne-Marie Iemmolo has come to Arizona State University and The Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication to not only further her academic career but offer her own unique perspective as a previous undergraduate student from Canada and a current graduate student at ASU.
Iemmolo was born and raised in Niagara Falls, Canada, by her mother and father who raised her to be both a sports fan and an academic writer. While Iemmolo’s athletic career was short-lived, her love for sports and writing brought her to Cronkite in 2023.
“I always thought I would just go to college to be an English teacher because that seemed easier, but it wasn’t until the 8th grade that I actually realized that being a journalist was a career,” Iemmolo said. “I had no idea really, so I thought ‘Oh!’ I can do that and so from that point on I decided I wanted to go to Carleton.”
Carleton University is where Iemmolo graduated in 2023 with a BA in Journalism which eventually led her to The Valley. Growing up in Canada, Iemmolo grew up a big hockey and American football fan due to her father’s love of sports, while her love of writing and stories stemmed from her relationship with her mother.
Iemmolo’s mother, Tanja, moved to Canada only speaking Serbian when she was 26, providing Anne-Marie a bilingual home where she learned to speak both Serbian and English which has helped cultivate her professional skill sets and has broadened her outreach as a journalist.
Iemmolo.
Her passion for journalism developed even further when she had the opportunity to cover high school football for a local paper after her teacher asked if any students would be interested in covering sports.
When Iemmolo decided to make the jump to ASU and Cronkite, she was a little wary of the situation as she was moving thousands of miles away from her parents, her friends, and her country.
“It was tough,” Iemmolo said. “I think it was because when I moved away for my undergrad in Ottawa, I didn’t know anyone there and it was a six-hour drive, but it was still in the same country…so it just felt different moving here.” However, Iemmolo found solace in a like-minded person who happened to be enrolled in the same program and the two connected before the move out to Phoenix.
Once arriving Iemmolo found even more individuals within the grad program that shared her love for writing and storytelling. Iemmolo is a self-proclaimed introvert who believes her friends would describe her as shy until you ask her a few questions. Her passion for writing and storytelling has pushed her towards a more behind-the-scenes profession rather than an in-your-face personality.
After spending just an hour conversing, Iemmolo did not seem shy at all when talking about her passion for the industry and her role in it in her first semester as a grad student.
“I’m thinking about producing, in our undergrads we had a radio show we worked for that also did video stuff, and I did like more of the production side,” Iemmolo said.
“Finding stories I really wanted to focus on and talking to sources.”
