Keith Hejna

ABOUT ME

NAME: Keith Alan Hejna

DOB: November 14, 1985

Job: Public Relations Assistant for Little Kids Rock

HOMETOWN: Montvale, NJ 07645

HIGH SCHOOL: Pascack Hills High School

COLLEGE: The Pennsylvania State University, The University of Wollongong (one semester abroad)

DEGREE: BA in Public Relations

MINORS: History and International Studies

SPORTS TEAMS: NY Mets, NY Jets, NY Knicks, NY Rangers, Penn State Nittany Lions

INTERESTS: Pickup baseball, Playing harmonica, Classic Rock, Going to concerts, Reading anything from novels to newspapers, Exotic foods, Hawaiian shirts, Bandanas, Making sandwiches, Going to sporting events  

Summary

My name is Keith Hejna and I was born and raised in Montvale, NJ. For other New Jerseyites, this is exit 172 off the Garden State Parkway - the last exit north before you get to New York.

I live with my family: my father, Mark, my mother, Lois, and my twin brothers, Scott and Doug. Scott is a sophomore at Virginia Tech and is majoring in Economics. Doug is a sophomore at Penn State and is majoring in Industrial Engineering.
I am currently a Public Relations Assistant at Little Kids Rock, a national non-profit organization that restores and revitalizes music education in public schools by donating rock n' roll instruments, teaching a hip curriculum, and organizing celebrity visits. It is like a real life "School of Rock" only on a much larger scale - LKR reaches over 40,000 kids in 20 US cities.

In addition to LKR, I wait tables at CrossRoads Bar and Restaurant in Nanuet, NY. This is the second time in my life that I have been a waiter - I worked at Chilis in the Palisades Mall in 2004.

As a volunteer effort, I am an assistant baseball coach at my former middle school, Fieldstone, in Montvale, NJ. I also play twice a week on a softball team in White Plains, NY.In my spare time, of which there is usually very little, I do some freelance work for Gotham Sports Media LLC. as an Editorial Assistant. The company, started by Mark Healy in 2005, is an internet-based New York sports company that is driven by website traffic. The focus is on Mets and Yankees baseball, however all levels of all New York sports are covered. The site has forums, news stories, radio shows, fantasy sports, and a quarterly magazine called Gotham Baseball Magazine. I am learning from Mark how to interview for print stories and radio shows, as well as how to drive traffic to the website. I write columns and occasionally serve as a co-host on Live from Mickey Mantle's, an online radio show.
I graduated from Penn State (Class of 2008) where I majored in public relations. I benefited from being in PRSSA as I was able to take part in some PR efforts on campus, listen to advice from established public relations professionals, and get involved with grassroots efforts to raise money for Dance Marathon (THON) - the largest student-run philanthropy in the country.

I was also a member of the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism, which allowed me to take Sports Information and Sports Writing classes. We went on field trips that included the Yogi Berra Museum, and listened to successful sports journalists like Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams (the authors of Game of Shadows).

My internship with Penn State Athletic Communications allowed me to view how a Division-IA college handles its athletic public/media relations efforts from a behind-the-scenes position. I worked several athletic events, spending hours in the press boxes of Penn State's finest athletic facilities, including Beaver Stadium, The Bryce Jordan Center, and Medlar Field at Lubrano Park. I wrote game stories for the website (www.gopsusports.com), kept statistics, gave score updates, typed game notes and assisted in postgame press conferences. I also spent a lot of time in the Sports Information office completing tasks like newspaper clipping. Finally, I wrote several feature stories for the website and for gameday programs that are available under the "Writing Samples" Tab.

I am an avid sports fan, which is why I took my passion for writing and combined it with college athletics while I attended Penn State. I follow pro and college football and pro baseball very closely, while keeping an eye on other sports new as well. My family had season tickets to NY Jets games for several years and that served as a great bonding experience for my father, brothers and I. While I enjoy watching, attending and reading about sports, I also enjoy playing them. I often play pickup baseball games with friends.

I truly enjoy traveling as well. I studied abroad at the University of Wollongong in NSW, Australia during the spring semester of my junior year. It was an amazing experience. I met several people from all over the world, saw new animals, learned how to surf, went skydiving and much more. I also visited Thailand, which was and even bigger culture shock than Australia. I hope to go back one day, and I also plan to visit Europe.