Category Archives: Alumni

       
 

Insights from a Michigan Public environmental reporting intern

By Elinor Epperson

Everyone says this, but WOW – this summer really flew by! I worked in the newsroom of Michigan Public, the state’s largest NPR news affiliate, as an environment intern. I had never thought about doing broadcast before (other than podcasts). But I was thrilled to get the call that I had the gig and was ready to dive in.

The first thing I noticed was how friendly and welcoming everyone was. The rapport among the journalists and staff there is incredible. I had never experienced that level of healthy work culture at a job before (and I’ve been in the workforce for over 10 years). 

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Great Lakes Now internship: telling environmental and social justice stories

Mia Litzenberg

Major: Journalism (Environment, Science, and Health Reporting concentration) Minor: Environmental studies and sustainability

Year: Junior

Internship: News Reporting Intern, Detroit PBS Great Lakes Now

It feels surreal to be wrapping up my internship with Detroit PBS Great Lakes Now. These past 13 weeks have flown by and I feel like I was just getting started.

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Knight Center alumna wins First Amendment award

Carol Terracina-Hartman, a Knight Center alumna and assistant professor of journalism and mass communications at Murray State University, has won the Louis E. Inglehart First Amendment Award from the College Media Association.

The award is named to honor Ingelhart, a retired Ball State University journalism professor, who dedicated his academic career to studying and teaching the First Amendment. An awardee has to make an extraordinary, long-term contribution in support of the First Amendment.

 

Environmental lessons I learned in Australia

By Cameryn Cass

The first time I left America, I didn’t get very far: I went to Toronto for a mini-holiday. Though only four and a half hours from my hometown, it felt much farther than that. It was exciting and new and – dare I say – foreign. Unlike my 19-year-old peers, I was drawn to the city for something other than legal drinking: I went in search of adventure.

You see, I enjoy living outside my comfort zone. I figure the more I do, the larger that zone will become.

Former Great Lakes Echo writer Cameryn Cass on the scene in Australia

So for my final semester at Michigan State, I decided to pack my bags and live 9,370 miles (15,080 kilometers) from home in Sydney, Australia. Instead of studying abroad, I interned at a lovely nonprofit called the Ethics Centre in the heart of the city.

I had the opportunity to write and edit stories and meet philosophers and experience imposter syndrome daily. I got used to spelling color with a “u” and writing the date with the number first, followed by the month. Did you know writing the date with the number sandwiched between the month and year is almost exclusively American? I think we ought to reconsider how we write that. And also adopt the metric system.

But, back to Australia. My internship went from February to mid-April, but I stayed until July 24 (24 July). I saw Brisbane and sat beside kangaroos all afternoon at Steve Irwin’s Australia Zoo. I hiked at Cradle Mountain and easily fell in love with Hobart, Tasmania.

I visited New Zealand and its Hobbiton, having never seen the Hobbit or Lord of the Rings films and left a piece of my heart in Queenstown.

And I got lost in the equatorial heat and traffic lightless roads of Bali, visiting my cousin there for 15 days. Continue reading