SUNY Oswego is one of the pioneering institutions involved in the launch of SUNY’s Institute for Local News this fall. The program connects talented students with valuable experiences to help hometown newspapers collect stories that might otherwise go untold.

Eileen Gilligan, an associate professor in SUNY Oswego’s journalism program, is among the 14 initial faculty champions statewide selected to develop campus programs and collaborations with the Center for Community News, which is based at the University of Vermont.

This is the first statewide program of its kind in the United States to address news deserts and struggling local news outlets with college student-produced content. An increasing number of corporate mergers and challenging local economies have led to more and more news deserts, or communities that do not have a local news outlet covering items of community importance.

“I'm proud that SUNY Oswego's journalism program is on the ground floor of this SUNY-wide effort, continuing our work promoting and teaching community journalism,” Gilligan said. “People have been talking about news deserts for over a decade; I'm glad we can help do something about filling those.”

For its first semester, students in Gilligan's "Community Journalism" class are working with Charles Ellis, editor of the Oswego daily The Palladium-Times, covering board meetings and other activities to supplement the efforts of the paper’s modest staff. 

“I think they’re learning a lot about how local governments work,” Gilligan said. “They really get to go to these meetings and see government in action.”

Students in the class such as Emily Sosa said that they have learned a lot in the process.

“If anything, it emphasizes that journalists need to be there reporting on some of these towns and meetings because people aren’t going and finding out what’s happening,” Sosa said.

Student Nacir Meikle said he has learned how to earn a level of trust and acceptance. He wasn't sure how much of an outsider he might have been considered as a student and often the only person of color in these town meetings.

“The people in the meetings know everyone in town, they are like one big family,” Meikle said. “But the more I would go to these places, the more they started treating me like somebody they’ve known for multiple years.”

“When we’re going to towns we’ve never even heard of. I have to research towns to know more about them so I can learn what people are talking about better,” said another student in the class, Noah Lika.

Student Holden Reynolds said the course provided “a newfound respect” for journalists and how challenging the job can be. “You have to learn a lot of patience when you’re waiting for people to get back to you,” Reynolds said.

“This course has been eye-opening for the students,” Gilligan said. “They've learned how small-town governments work and how a local newspaper fits into that environment. They've also learned all the many details that go into every single story and that the story won't run until they've found out the answers to all the editor's questions.”

Valuable experience

Students in the class agreed that the opportunity to do so much interviewing has definitely served them well.

“Developing your interviewing skills and learning how to ask questions” was what Sosa identified as two of the most valuable lessons. “Journalism is about asking for and getting the answers. This is really getting me out of my comfort zone in a good way.”

“Even if you’re not looking to go into a journalism field, this class has helped build people skills, learn how to ask questions and how to talk to people in a professional manner,” Reynolds said. “Some people who might be introverts might find that part tough, but this can help.”

“I want to go into broadcasting specifically but this is a different viewpoint on how to interview,” Meikle said. “I like how this class has helped me build so many different views.”

The course also has helped students learn about their rights as journalists, avenues such as Freedom of Information Law requests and the knowledge that they are entitled to responses from local governmental bodies when covering their meetings.

“The students deal with real life in this course: They must get to the night meetings from the Town of Oswego to Schroeppel, figure out what's going on and write up a story about it,” Giligan said. They also learn how tight deadlines are with local news –- a much faster turnaround than a typical academic assignment.

About the SUNY Institute for Local News

Announced in October, the SUNY Institute for Local News is made possible by funding from Lumina Foundation and in partnership with the Center for Community News. Lumina has committed $150,000 over the next two years toward faculty champions and its impact award program. Lumina support is part of Press Forward, a national movement to strengthen communities by reinvigorating local news. 

SUNY committed an additional $160,000 over the next two years toward up to 20 summer reporting internships, which will pair student journalists with their hometown news outlets.

“Journalism is the keystone of a healthy democracy, but as thousands of local news outlets have closed their doors or dramatically reduced staffing since the mid-2000s, that keystone is chipping away,” SUNY Chancellor John B. King Jr. said in announcing the program. “Higher education can help these ‘news deserts’ while providing our students with the hands-on learning experience of delivering local content to struggling platforms through academic collaborations. I am grateful for the support of the Lumina Foundation for making this vital collaboration happen.”

Students in university-led student reporting programs provided more than 12,000 published local news stories to struggling media enterprises around the country last year, according to the Center for Community News. Often called news/academic partnerships, SUNY ILN allows students to provide content, vetted and edited by a faculty member, to local media outlets to give them the experience they need to succeed as journalists.

The SUNY Institute for Local News identifies existing academic collaborations with local news outlets; works with individual campuses to develop new programs; hosts training sessions and meetings; develops templates and best practices specific to the SUNY System; seeks additional funding for strategic investments in state news deserts; shares and coordinate system-wide credit-earning experiential learning opportunities; and builds collaborations between colleges and universities.