Local And Networked Journalism On Campus

Do you remember your college newspaper? Where its pages often filled with thought provoking articles by serious student journalists and in-depth analysis pieces on community goings-on or cultural values, social standards, sexual mores, etc?

Or were the pages of your college newspaper (or other college papers you’ve seen) filled with the banal, the bestial, and the belligerent rantings of students training for careers in punditry rather than provocative, remarkable careers?

The Daily Collegian at Penn State University is published by a non-profit parent corporation, Collegian, Inc. The company’s annual costs are approximately $1.5 million, which includes use of a large physical plant, printing press, full-time staff of about 12, paper and ink costs, and student stipends.

There is a serious void in terms of non-profit and philanthropic aid on state and national levels for the development of the next generation of compelling, technologically advanced and thoughtful campus news media.

Proposal
New or existing philanthropies or business ventures should target major campuses across the nation and/or those campuses which represent thought leaders amongst their higher education peers and invest annually to establish independent weekly print newspapers with a web and multimedia component updated daily.

Using only minimal wire content to satisfy national news coverage, these media groups would focus on the emerging trend of so-called hyperlocal journalism by recruiting local professors, thinkers, workers, farmers, businessmen, students etc. in each community to generate original, compelling content worth saving and worth talking about in addition to student news reporting. (more…)