Learning how to become recognized as a TV critic once you have TV show criticisms published online, in a newspaper or trade magazine can be accomplished easily by applying to the Television Critics Association (TCA). The Television Critics Association is “a group of United States and Canadian journalists and columnists who cover television programming”. The Television Critics Association is “a non-profit organization…covering the television industry for newspapers, magazines and advertiser-supported online sites”.
Television Critics Association TCA Logo
Unlike some analogous associations, the TCA gives their members something very useful twice a year: a press tour. This is not an ordinary press tour but one that furnishes Television Critics Association members in Los Angeles, California with the opportunity to make “face-to-face contacts with network executives, producers and actors…A TCA Press Tour allows the major television networks, cable networks and the Public Broadcasting Service to present their slate of upcoming programs to a large group of press writers from different outlets all at once through panels and interviews. These biannual conferences involve registered TCA members staying at a chosen Los Angeles venue for two to three weeks, and each network is assigned a series of days to showcase their programming.”
So if you have great TV show reviews or editorials somewhere accessible for perusal and want to be officially and nationally recognized as a TV critic, consider applying to the TCA.
Television Critics Association applications are “accepted twice a year: Aug. 15-Sept. 1 and March 15-April 1.”
During the application, you will need to supply:
three (3) clips of your recent work writing about television. If these clips are not on the web, you must mail them to us. Type “snail mail” in each of the three blanks below if you do not have Web links.
You will also need to supply other technical and biographical information.
You can apply to the Television Critics Association here.
