Six years removed from Pepperdine, Adam Housley provides battlefield news for FOX News Channel.
By Jen Clay
Staff Writer
Only miles from combat, Pepperdine alumnus Adam Housley continues to report from Kuwait City as a correspondent for Fox News Channel.
A 1997 Pepperdine graduate with degrees in political science and telecommunications, Housley has been in the Middle East since mid-January.
Before arriving in the Kuwaiti capital, Housley spent time on the front lines with troops preparing for ground invasion and on the destroyer that eventually fired the first tomahawk missile. Although Fox News did offer Housley a Middle East-based position, his acceptance was voluntary.
“I decided to take the missile watch in Kuwait City, which has been very interesting and dangerous, but not nearly as dangerous as the men and women who are traveling with the troops,” Housley said in an e-mail interview.
Reporting live an average of eight times a day and contributing up to five radio reports, Housley ultimately decides on segment topics but still works as a team with his four-member crew. Previous reports have included an on-scene report from a Kuwaiti shopping mall damaged from the debris of an exploding Iraqi missile as well as updates on the troublesome Middle-Eastern weather. The FNC Kuwait City office houses an approximate staff of 30 and is equipped with everything from satellite and video phones to “a simple scarf to keep the sand and dust out of your face,” Housley said.
Housley also appreciates and understands his unique opportunity.
“I am missing my family and friends, but I’m still witnessing history at this point,” he said.
He hopes to return to the United States soon, but no date is currently confirmed.
Housley keeps in daily contact with friends and family via e-mail. One of those friends is Professor of Political Science Dr. Dan Caldwell who had Housley in three political science courses. While he confirmed Housley’s budding interest in broadcast journalism as an undergraduate, Caldwell pointed to Housley’s love for politics as a possible key to his future.
“I believe that sometime in the future he’d like to run for political office,” Caldwell said.
Other professors remember Housley fondly. Professor of Journalism Dr. Mike Jordan had Housley as a student in his Mass Communication Law class.
“Adam was an excellent student,” he said.
While at Pepperdine, Housley pitched for the 1992 National-Champion Waves baseball team, was elected Homecoming King, served as Student Government Association President and wrote for the Graphic. Housley took advantage of the opportunities an education at Pepperdine could afford him.
“I took a wide variety of classes from the most difficult courses I could find,” he said. “Dr. Caldwell among others helped me tremendously in my studies of international relations.”
Ironically, Housley was a student at Pepperdine during the onset of Operation Desert Storm and rallied in favor of the war at on-campus debates and protests in Westwood.
“I had a suitemate in dorm two who missed the first two weeks of school because of the invasion,” Housley said. “He lived in Kuwait and was snuck out by an Iraqi friend. His stories of the Iraqi atrocities were a rallying point for many at Pepperdine.”
After graduation, Housley competed in the minor leagues and briefly pursued a career in professional baseball. He began his professional broadcasting career in Napa, Calif. at KVON-KVYN radio, where he developed and produced newscasts. After working as a live reporter for KCPM-TV (NBC) in Chico, Calif. from 1997-1998, Housley served as a reporter at KTXL-TV (Fox) in Sacramento from 1999-2001. He also served as lead reporter for the independent, Santa-Rosa-based KFTY-TV from 1998-2000 and won a 2001 regional Emmy for his work with KFTY-TV.
Housley joined Fox News in 2001 as a Los Angeles-based correspondent. For FNC he has covered both the Winona Ryder and Robert Blake investigations and traveled to Pakistan, Israel and Palestine. He received a 2001 Regional Associated Press Reporting Award and a regional RTDNA Reporting Award.
Housley offers this advice to current Pepperdine students.
“No matter what anyone says to you, if you work hard, believe in yourself, remain level headed, trust in God and enjoy family and friends … you will succeed,” he said. “Believe it or not, while I had tremendous support at Pepperdine and I look on my time there very fondly, I had people (there) who said I wouldn’t make it in television or in baseball. I didn’t listen.”
April 03, 2003