More Inspired than Retired

BREATHE, I TOLD MYSELF, just walk in. I stood on the other side of the door to my first meeting with the staff of The Beacon, UP’s student newspaper. You can do this, I told myself. I held my sticker-covered laptop and three story ideas. I pushed open the door. As I looked around the room, I noticed everyone seemed to be engrossed in conversation except for me. Did I even belong here? Then, Nancy Copic, the longtime Beacon advisor, came up to me, welcomed me to the team, and started asking questions:

“Did you get your press pass?”

“Do you want a Beacon beanie?”

“We are so excited to have you on the team.”

Nancy made me feel like I had a place at The Beacon, even if I was an inexperienced journalist. We shared our story ideas. Any chance she got to tell someone a story idea was great, she didn’t hesitate to highlight them and the idea. 

After my first meeting, I was committed to becoming the best reporter I could be. And I knew that working closely with Nancy would help me get there. I signed up for almost weekly meetings with her, asking her for guidance—how do I prepare for an interview? how do I craft a lede?—and feedback on how I could improve. Nancy had been in my shoes as the reporter 13 years prior. From her first TV news gig in Bend, Oregon, to anchoring in Kansas City, Missouri, at KOIN in Portland, and finally at KGW, she dedicated herself to being a fair, honest, and sharp journalist. During her 27-year journey in the field, she also became a mother to three children, now grown.

In 2009, Nancy found a new calling here at University of Portland to help the next generation of young journalists find their voice. Her passion for journalism naturally evolved into a passion for teaching it. And her legacy is indisputable: The Beacon won more than 300 journalism awards during her tenure.

As a mentor, she helped dozens of students build a path toward their aspirations. And many have gone on to successful careers in a very challenging field.

By my second year at The Beacon, I knew I wanted to be a journalist after I graduated from UP. But I still had doubts. One day, while I was teary-eyed on a bench outside of Clark Library, I told her I didn’t believe I could do it. I was struggling with my mental health, and quitting seemed like the only option. Looking back, I feel like I had a lot of moments like that with her where I felt like giving up, but Nancy was always there, telling me that I could do it and becoming my personal cheerleader through every moment of self-doubt.

Even now, if my assignment is tough—say, when I need to cold-call families who have lost loved ones to homicide or ask witnesses at a crime scene if they’ve seen anything I should know or knock on doors not knowing who will answer—I try to invoke the confidence Nancy taught me to have.

Scrolling through my text messages on my phone, I find dozens of texts that are a testament to her support.

“You are a superstar,” she wrote to me after I had my interview for The New York Times Corps Program. She had encouraged me to apply, and I became the first Oregon college student accepted into the program.

“I can’t think of a better candidate. They would be lucky to have you!” she wrote when I secured my first journalism internship at Street Roots through the Charles Snowden Program for Excellence in Journalism.

“You are gonna MAKE IT. I believe in you 100%,” she wrote when I got rejected from The Oregonian’s internship program in 2023.

I finished an internship there this summer. “So proud of you! Keep it up!” she wrote the first time I wrote for The New York Times.

The Beacon gave me my start, but Nancy taught me to believe in myself. It’s hard to put into words how grateful I am to have had someone like Nancy in my life. Now, I see her as more than a mentor. Recently, I called her when I was having trouble finding a job. It was five months after graduation, and I felt like I was 18 again, asking her to help me understand how to write a nut graf or lede. Everything is going to work out, she told me. It did. As of this writing, I’m one month into my new job as a reporter for The Columbian.

Congratulations on your retirement, Nancy. If you take even a fraction of your curiosity into this next phase of your life, I know you will thrive and you will lift others up along the way. Thank you for teaching me to believe in myself. I will carry your lessons with me for the rest of my life.

KIMBERLY CORTEZ ’25 is an award-winning journalist and a graduate of the Dorothy Day Social Work Program. She has previously written for Street Roots, The Oregonian, and The New York Times.