The old formula went like this: Journalism undergrads would learn in classes and maybe work on the school paper and then get professional experience via internships or summer jobs at news outlets.
But with the local news industry reeling, this dynamic has flipped. Instead of news organizations giving boosts to students, students are supporting often-short-staffed outlets by providing coverage as part of their curricula. This shift is happening as an expanding network of universities step up to offer students real-world journalism experience while creating what they hope will be a viable business model to fill local news gaps in communities that lack robust reporting.
The University of Vermont was not the first school with students providing local news coverage, but it is central to this burgeoning national movement. Richard Watts had noticed the dwindling number of news internships and mentorship opportunities available to his University of Vermont journalism students when he created the school’s Community News Service in 2019 to get them out into the surrounding communities to report.
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The Community News Service provides edited copy to about 15 partnering local news outlets while posting the stories on its own website. These stories are meant to be shared. Beneath the byline is a “Republish” button, which offers a ready-made copy of the story plus guidelines for the republisher. For one, the outlet picking up the story must credit the reporter and Community News Service; if nothing else, the student reporter gets a professional clip out of the deal. Also, the outlet shouldn’t make significant changes to the copy without at least a discussion with the CNS editor and report
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Viewing this formula as a win-win that could be replicated with other universities and news-strapped regions across the country, Watts founded and became director of theCenter for Community News in 2022. This organization, also based at UVM, works with universities nationwide to grow their local news programs. Watts said about 150 universities or colleges are engaged in such programs so far. “Nearly 3,000 student reporters in university-led programs published more than 11,000 stories in local news outlets last year,” the CCN reports.
