If you are a fan of WISN-TV 5:00 PM newscast beat, then you’d probably have a glimpse of who Toya Washington is. WISN-TV is an affiliate of ABC stationed in Milwaukee. Toya joined WISN 12 News in December 2002 exactly two decades ago after previously working with Wisconsin for six years as a reporter. She is currently serving as co-anchor together with Patrick Paolantonio for the 5:00 PM newscast.
She has previously co-anchored the top rate 6:00 pm newscast and also a reporter for 12 News This Morning show which airs on weekdays from 5:00 am to 7:00 am
Throughout her career, she has fetched several accolades including four regional Emmy award nominations that include the Chicago/Midwest Regional Emmy Award for outstanding achievements within a regularly scheduled news program, spot coverage and breaking news coverage among other major accolades.
Who Is Toya Washington?
Toya Washington is an African-American television reporter and news anchorwoman of Nigerian descent born and raised in Minneapolis USA an only child to her parents who are not so known in the public sphere.
She’s best known for her Significant TV presence and the co-anchor for the newscast show and four-time nominee award winner. She studied journalism and Women’s studies at the UW Madison University where after she joined WCCO-TV as an intern, a course that activated her expertise in journalism and has since poured her all throughout her career.
Close sources reveal that she developed her passion for journalism way back in high school. As a bright student, this secured her an internship at a top-ranked Minneapolis TV, WCCO-TV which cultivated her career. Thereafter, she joined the university for a bachelor’s degree in journalism and women’s studies in the year 1996.
Beyond a successful journalism career, Toya is a dedicated wife and a mother. With her husband, they share two adorable children.
Toya Washington career
Her first career step started during her high school internship where she interned at a CBS-affiliate television station that has since resulted in her current successful career. Her first employment was at WISC-TV as a weekend news anchor and reporter, a position she held for six years.
From there, she moved to ABC-affiliated WISN-TV where she has served in different positions up to this day including co-anchoring the top-rated 6.00 PM newscast and reporter for the same station.
In the year 2004, she was privileged as one of the lead anchors at WISN-TV covering the US presidential elections where she got the chance to interview various prominent faces like Tommy Thompson, the former secretary of Health and Human resource and Wisconsin government and business politician Herbert Kohl including various other famous participants of the ABC’s talk show “The View”
Awards and Accolades
In the early days of her career, Toya was selected to MC for the Freedom Fund reception by the NAACP Waukesha 2003 where Oprah Winfrey was an invitee. She was praised for her good work.
Toya has also been an active member of the National Association of Black Journalists. She holds an honorary position on the board of Visitors for the UW Madison School of Journalism and Mass communication.
She also enjoys the sponsorship of the university of UW Madison in the school of communications, department of University relations.
She has also won 4 regional Emmy awards for her outstanding work.
In 2008, she was rewarded with the second place for the best feature reporter or life story or series category during the annual Milwaukee Press Club Excellence in Journalism Awards.
In 2015, she was also named the Wisconsin journalist in residence by her Alma Mater where she met with faculty, staff and students in the classrooms and informal settings to share her daily journalism experiences with them. They discussed several topics including newsgathering and distribution for the current generation as she shared the real-world perspective of the field to them.
During that time, she also managed to inspect some of the facilities resources and found out that the residency was a mutually beneficial program everyone.
Toya Washington net worth
There are very many speculations around Toya’s net worth and some of the factors contributing to it include her period of employment.
Close sources hint that an average anchor in Milwaukee is paid $37,500 annually which stereotypically might have her in the same range
But considering she’s been a long-serving employee of the TV station and having actively co-anchored for nearly two decades now, there is a likely hood this will affect her salary range. Going as per the fellow long-serving news anchors, her wealth is cumulatively around $700, 000 to $900,000 or even higher depending on the payment terms of the station.
Toya Washington social media presence
As time goes by, social media has proved to be an important aspect of our lives. Almost all of us and especially for public figures, social media is a key factor. However, things are different for Toya. Through the years, she has managed to keep her family affairs secret. This includes her family. Nobody knows much about her parents besides being fo an African American descent or do we know about her siblings and education life.
To add on, there is very scanty information about her personal life from children and marriage including the surname of her husband and where they met which is quite different.
While she’s not strange to the social media craze, she’s kept her personal life all to herself.
A quick social media tour reveals about 8,500 followers on Facebook and over 4,000 followers on Twitter.
Cyberbullying encounter online
Online harassment for a female journalist has become a global pandemic. On average, at least one of ten female journalists across the world have been cyberbullied. This trend has been ongoing for a while. Thanks to social media, we now have to worry about keyboard warriors targeting female journalists.
Studies show that shame and social stigma tied to sexual harassment online and in the workplace oftentimes prevent female journalists from reporting the ordeal thus remain silent about the torment while others end up quitting their jobs to counter the pain. A few brave ones come out to defend themselves or report the cases.
At one particular time back in 2017, a fan accused her of indecent dressing while going about her journalistic duties as usual. She wore a black camisole with a black V-necked blouse on newscast which was a decent outfit but the fan argued otherwise and accused her of feeling her age.
Gladly, she was bold enough to defend herself and rebuked the accusations. Hers is just an example of what happens online to female journalist across the world from pay gaps to physical abuse.
A study on the safety of women journalist on breaking the cycle of silence and violence shows that female journalists in nine countries across Asia, Africa, Middle East and South America share similar challenges in the workplace that range from physical, online harassment, gender-based unequal opportunities such as low pay and working hours and many more. Which is the exact case with what happened with Toya thanks to her brevity she was able to silence the allegations.
Toya Washington has been practising in the field of journalism close to two decades and as the saying goes, old is gold, she is a true inspiration to many of her fans who look up to her every day. From her zeal to the determination get to who she is should be all you work on this year to achieve your future goals and priorities.
Are you looking forward to reading about your favourite public figure soon? Read on because we have a whole list of them coming up for you.
