By Emilio Perez Ibarguen

Emilio Perez Ibarguen

It’s hard to wrap my mind around the fact that my 12 weeks covering the environment at Bridge Michigan are over, but I’d like to think that’s partly due to how busy I was chasing interesting stories all over the state.

From the very start, this internship allowed me to dive headfirst into many different policy debates, research findings and human interest stories. I became adept at learning new concepts on the fly, asking informed questions to experts and translating my reporting into a compelling narrative for readers.

One of the most challenging yet rewarding parts of my internship was going through edits with my editors at Bridge. Most stories I filed involved a consistent back-and-forth, tweaking lines for readability and forcing me to justify every detail I include in my story. While the process could be demanding at times, it pushed me to be more thoughtful in how every line in a story should help the public better understand a topic. Continue reading →

By Clara Lincolnhol

Clara Lincolnhol

My Knight Center summer internship with PBS/NPR-affiliate WKAR in East Lansing recently came to an end. It’s safe to say the expectations I had going into the job were exceeded. I walked away feeling like I had grown significantly, both as a person and a reporter.

Throughout this internship, I worked as an environmental news and radio reporting intern. I had the opportunity to localize my favorite beat to the community I live in. It was incredibly fulfilling covering my own and other nearby communities in Mid-Michigan and being a part of both local journalism and public media.

Having the opportunity to go on-site and interview people who were directly involved in or affected by issues was an immensely valuable experience.

A challenge I faced was adjusting to writing for radio and then voicing it. As someone used to print, it was difficult at times to effectively cut back what I was trying to say into verbiage better suited for a spoken, minute time slot. Thankfully my mentors at WKAR gave me great guidance. I felt that towards the end of my internship, I better understood how to write engaging copy + record a voiceover–and found it fun too! Continue reading →