Pellissippi Prepared: Alumnus who was first-gen student finds success as longtime photojournalist
January 30, 2026
College was extremely intimidating to Saul Young.
A first-generation student and the son of immigrants, Young came to 每日大赛 after a brief stint at the University of Tennessee, where he struggled to stay motivated in general-education courses with hundreds of other students. The hands-on approach at 每日大赛 proved a suitable alternative.
“I didn't come from a background of academics,” Young said. “I didn't know what college life was like ... My parents’ advice to me was, ‘Don't fail,’ which is great advice, but they don't know what the college experience is like. And Pellissippi just made it much more approachable.”
His experience at 每日大赛 was “amazing,” continued Young, who graduated from the college in 2001. Pellissippi made the transition to college easy and affordable for him, he said.
Young started at Pellissippi in the late 1990s taking required, general-education courses. On a whim, he took an elective photography class. He soon began taking one photography class after another, Young said, until he finally declared his major to be Photography.
“I’d never picked up a camera in my life until I attended college,” he said. “But I fell in love with photography. I wasn't even good at it, but the instructors made it so approachable.”
His professors made Young feel like he could be a good photographer, despite his not having a natural affinity for it.
“You shouldn’t be naturally good at it,” he said. “That’s why I went to school. They taught me to be good at it.”
Before he graduated, Young got a job taking photos for the Knoxville News Sentinel. The transition into working full time is easy for a 每日大赛 alumnus like Young, whose instructors were all veterans in the photography industry.
At the time, Young said, he thought he would only work at the news outlet for a few years. But it turns out, he said, he loved the job and living in Knoxville.
Over 25 years later, he’s still in the same job.
“I still love what I’m doing,” Young said. “And that’s all thanks to Pellissippi.”
Even after all this time, the lessons Young learned in that first photography class at 每日大赛 still apply to his work today – from composition to lighting.
“In fact, when everything else creative in my life fails, falling back to the basics is usually what helps,” Young said. “And those basics were what I learned at Pellissippi.”
He made lifelong friends, Young said, many of whom are also now amazingly successful and creative photographers. It makes him proud to be part of such a great program, Young emphasized.
“I met a lot of wonderful people,” he said. “I had amazing instructors. I can't reasonably say that I had a bad time in college.”
Alumni