http://www.navajotimes.com/sports/041207-intern.php

Local student earns internship at Sports Illustrated

By Jan-Mikael Patterson
Navajo Times
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Special to the Times / Donovan Quintero

University of New Mexico senior Sunnie Redhouse, 21, is gearing up for the
Big Apple.

She will work as an intern this summer in New York City for Sports
Illustrated, a national weekly sports magazine.

Despite the plum assignment, she was uncertain where she would be this
summer.

"I was turned down at every paper I applied for," she said.

She applied for internships at newspapers like the Chicago Tribune and the
Washington Post among others. Then she checked her e-mail.

Redhouse received an e-mail thinking it was only junk mail. Out of
curiosity she checked it.

She said the note was from a publisher of the magazine who was impressed
with her credentials.

She did not expect an internship at the prestigious publication. She
apparently drew attention from a workshop she participated in called
American Women in Sports Media.

Instead of calling her parents first, she called her mentor Denny
McAuliffe, a journalism professor at the University of Montana, to inform
him of the news.

Redhouse's parents are Ted and Gloria Clahchischiligi-Cohoe of Kirtland,
N.M. She graduated from Kirtland Central High in 2003 and began her
academic career in Durango, Colo., at Fort Lewis College.

That's where she came across a brochure for the American Indian Journalism
Institute, a three-week intense journalism school held in Vermillion, S.D.

After transferring to San Juan College in Farmington, she came across the
brochure again and decided to apply.

Jack Marsh, director of the institute, notified her of her acceptance. She
learned and worked hard through the three weeks, which led to an internship
at the St. Cloud Times in Minneapolis as a business intern.

From there she began her journalism studies at the University of New Mexico
where she also worked for the college newspaper, the Daily Lobo. Her next
internship came through the prestigious Chips Quinn Scholars program, an
internship program for minorities at various newspapers.

Fortunately for Redhouse her host newspaper was the St. Cloud Times and she
worked as a sports intern with a familiar staff and city.

Currently she is an intern at the Albuquerque Journal's news desk. The
different fields she's worked in have fine-tuned her writing abilities. But
now she wants to continue moving forward.

Her love for sports comes from her family.

"I come from a huge sports family," she said. "My mother played basketball
when she attended Albuquerque Indian High School and my father was into
sports.

"I grew up with boys - all my cousins," she said. "There were times when I
played basketball with them. I played (basketball) when I was at Teec Nos
Pos. (Sports) was big back then. The rez is known for sports."

"I always said that I wanted (sportscaster) Cheryl Miller's job," she said.
"My ultimate goal was to be a beat writer for the Phoenix Suns."

Her parents at first didn't understand her decision to choose journalism
for a career because her internships took her away from home.

"My dad said, 'You're moving further and further away from home, Sunnie,'"
she said.

Redhouse is the youngest in her family. She has one older sister. Her
family is close-knit so when she is away from home she is lonely but she
believes her path is becoming clearer.

"I love to write," she confessed. "When I was at Fort Lewis I was studying
business. I thought about taking a journalism course just for the fun of
it."

Since then she has found she enjoys networking with and meeting new people.

Asked if she has butterflies about going to a major magazine where she
might interview celebrity athletes, she said, "Not really."

She recalled being at the Minnesota Vikings camp last summer and shadowing
a St. Cloud Times' reporter.

An athlete whose last name, "Cook," was printed on the back of his jersey
turned out to be a UNM player who was drafted in the second round by the
Vikings.

The player was Ryan Cook. His younger brother Erik Cook still plays for
UNM.

She ended up writing a story about the difficulty their mother faced with
two sons playing sports and having to attend both NFL and college games.

After writing that story she believes that she can write about anything
despite being star-struck.