Category Archives: Researcher stories

High schools receive environmental journalism grants

By Isabella Figueroa Nogueira

The Knight Center has awarded grants to four Michigan high schools to support collaboration between their journalism and environmental science classes. Their projects bring together scientific research and student storytelling while also connecting schools with professional mentors who guide the work.

The grants go to:

  • Manchester Junior/Senior High School in Manchester for a project centered on its long- running greenhouse program. Environmental science students grow and care for plants while learning sustainable practices, and journalism students document the process through stories, photo essays and video reports. The content will be shared through school publications, social media and local outlets, providing information to the community about sustainable agriculture and student work.

The teachers are Randy Smith and Carla Zygner.

  • The School at Marygrove in Detroit for a project focused on studying a natural area known as The Grove. Environmental science students research the health of the ecosystem and track environmental changes over time, while journalism students create multimedia stories to make those findings accessible to a broader audience. The project aims to raise awareness and encourage better environmental decision-making in the community

The teachers are Kerry Williams and Alistair Bomphray. Continue reading →

How journalists can be the scientist their story needs

By Shealyn Paulis

This is the 7th in a series of articles by Knight Center students who attended the annual conference of the National Association of Science Writers.

When journalists and science writers gathered in the windy city of Chicago, a panel offered space for veteran science reporters to share their experiences when their jobs called for a step beyond typical journalistic requirements.

These stories explored when journalists also became scientists, and how these experiences bettered their coverage.

The gathering of those concerned with science’s involvement with journalism comes as the Trump administration leads an unprecedented attack on science throughout its first year in office. This includes redrawn requirements for funding approval and historically large cuts to federal research funding in the name of efficiency.

In 2025, the National Science Foundation showed a 25% reduction in funding compared to the average of the past 10 years.

(Left to Right) Moderator Priyanka Runwal and panellists Patricia Clarembaux and Wendy Ruderman take questions from the SciWri2025 crowd following presentations.

The National Association of Science Writers session was organized and moderated by Priyanka Runwal, associate editor of Chemical & Engineering News. She began by introducing the topic of reporters conducting their own research and data-gathering methods, while emphasizing the crucial timing of the panel.

Runwal explained that as the scientific community faces mounting difficulties imposed by the government,  leaving journalists with fewer resources for their reporting.

If journalists gather and analyze their own data, they have the opportunity to not only enhance their coverage, but do some of the work researchers are unable to do during difficult times. Continue reading →

Open call for 2026 proposals for high school journalism and environmental science collaborations

To encourage collaboration between high school journalism and environmental science classes, we invite teachers to submit proposals for innovative class projects in which journalism students will report about field research by environmental science students. Our principal goals are:

  • to help young prospective journalists better understand and explain to the public how science is done
  • to help environmental science students learn to use the media to explain their work to the public.
  • to promote environmental and science journalism.

The Knight Center intends to award 1-year grants of $2,000 to up to 2 high schools: $1,000 to the journalism program and $1,000 to the environmental science program for equipment, software or scholarships. In addition, the Knight Center will pair each school with a professional journalist to serve as a mentor to participating students and teachers. Continue reading →

Five science writers share tips on how to make science stories entertaining and funny

Five science writers share tips on how to make science stories entertaining and funny

By Clara Lincolnhol

This is the 6th in a series of articles by Knight Center students who attended the recent annual conference of the National Association of Science Writers.

“Welcome to how to engage an audience,” said Kathyrn Jepson, the editor-in-chief for Symmetry Magazine and a science fiction editor.

Jepson and four other journalists spoke at a panel at the National Science Writers Conference in Chicago to share how writers can implement humor in their writing to get readers hooked on a scientific story.

Blythe Terrell, the executive editor at Science Vs., said a critical way to tell a funny science story is by getting the scientist in on a joke.

“One of the critical ways we do that is by giving scientists a space where they hopefully feel comfortable opening up and having just a little bit of fun,” Terrell said. “And that is often on our tape in our audio.”

She said they will write weird questions and see if the scientist wants to go along with them.

“It’s not like we aren’t taking the topic seriously. We are treating it with seriousness. The rest of the episode is serious, but we find space for these things and we find that really engages listeners,” Terrell said.

Kate Gammon, a comedian, and freelance journalist, said she writes a lot about crises, like the biodiversity crisis, the climate crisis and political crisis. “It felt sometimes like I was writing an obituary for nature,” Gammon said. “So I had to make jokes.” Continue reading →