The Virginian-Pilot
                             THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Wednesday, November 16, 1994           TAG: 9411150063
SECTION: DAILY BREAK              PAGE: E2   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: LARRY BONKO
                                             LENGTH: Medium:   72 lines

WANNA BE ON TV? LEARN FROM A PRO

MIKE FABRIZIO, who resigned recently as WVEC's weekend sports anchor, is going home to Florida to work on a project he calls How To Get On Television.

He plans to put his ideas on a videotape and sell the tape to TV wannabes for $24.95. Professor Fabrizio.

Fabrizio, who's spent 13 years in TV news, shared one of his tips with me:

Work for free when you're in college. Be a volunteer. Be an intern.

``It's a great way to show people that you have something on the ball.

``Learn to be a pest,'' said Fabrizio.

Too bad Stephanie Scunzo never met Fabrizio.

She graduated from Seton Hall with degrees in English and communications, and today she is overqualified for the work she does - selling perfume at a counter of a department store somewhere in New Jersey.

You'll see her tonight at 10 on MTV in the special ``Help Not Wanted,'' reported by Tabitha Soren of Hampton.

Stephanie grows frustrated looking for work suitable for somebody who's spent almost $100,000 for an education. She didn't learn how to operate a computer in college.

A mistake.

She didn't ask to be an intern at some big company to get acquainted with big business. Another mistake.

Soren did what Fabrizio says young people interested in broadcasting should do. She worked like a slave for free in New York City with CNN, ABC's ``World News Tonight'' and with WNBC.

After Soren graduated from high school in Hampton, she enrolled at New York University and not the University of Virginia, which her parents preferred. Even at 18, Soren was wise enough to know that the opportunities in broadcasting where not in Charlottesville, but in Manhattan.

``I interned all over the place,'' she said.

Today, at 27, she works 24 weeks for NBC, doing reports for ``Today,'' ``Dateline'' and other shows. She also works 24 weeks a year for MTV.

One day she's in Washington, interviewing Secretary of Labor Robert Reich. The next day she's dressed in black leather in a recording studio, talking to Tom Petty.

And it all started when she made a pest of herself and asked to be an intern at CNN, ABC and WNBC.

When doing the field work for ``Help Not Wanted: An MTV News Special Report,'' Soren said she felt a bit guilty about having a great job because so many well-educated people of her generation can't find work.

Unless they want to be temps. Or work in fast food. Or hitch up with the military.

In her report, Soren says that more than 30 percent of last summer's college graduates can't find a job or are working in places where you don't need a college degree. At one point in the MTV special, Seton Hall grad Scunzo says she's tired of answering the phone for United Parcel Service and considers becoming a waitress.

When her mother hears that, she hits the ceiling.

The family members said they didn't spent thousands and thousands of dollars to educate a waitress.

At graduation, Scunzo looks around at her classmates and comes to an unsettling conclusion: ``These 1,100 people will be trying to beat me out of a job.''

The last time she checked, said Soren, Stephanie was still selling perfume.

She says it isn't fair to call this a generation or slackers - young people who do not try hard enough to find work. ``They go on interview after interview. They try. But the jobs just aren't there fore them.''

Soon after finishing this MTV special, Soren stepped into one of those man-eating potholes in Manhattan and broke a bone in her foot.

She hasn't missed a day on camera. by CNB