Category Archives: Writing

Can college campuses be biodiversity arks?

Knight Center director Eric Freedman’s new feature article examining how universities can protect biodiversity appears in the spring issue of the environmental magazine Earth Island Journal with photos by journalism master’s student Donté Smith.

In reporting the story, Freedman and Smith traveled to Albion College in southern Michigan for a campus bio-tour with prairie ecologist Sheila Lyons-Sobaski.

Freedman also interviewed Tierra Curry, a senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity, plant biologist William Sanders of Florida Gulf Coast University, environmental science doctoral student Mikaela Sako of Baylor University in Texas and Daniel Orenstein, an associate professor of urban and regional planning at the Israel Institute of Technology, or Technion.

The article also drew on research by scientists in Indonesia, Portugal and China.

Paid summer reporting internships available for MSU students at five Michigan news organizations

Michigan State University students with diverse backgrounds and life experiences are eligible for five paid internships this summer at major multi-media Michigan news organizations.

These internships through MSU’s Knight Center for Environmental Journalism meet the MSU J-School’s internship requirement. Environmental expertise or particular interest is not required. But you’ll gain both.

The application deadline is 10 p.m. on March 26, 2025

Four internships are with members of the Great Lakes News Collaborative, a group of independent and multi-media news organizations. They are:

  • Bridge Michigan, Michigan’s largest nonprofit news service
  • Great Lakes Now at Detroit Public Television, a monthly magazine-style television program with online daily reports
  • Circle of Blue, a Traverse City-based news service reporting on worldwide water challenges
  • Michigan Public – Michigan’s largest NPR news outlet.

A fifth internship is at Planet Detroit, an independent nonprofit local news organization that reports on the environment and public health in Detroit and Southeast Michigan.

FAQ

Q: Who is eligible?

A: Michigan State University students with diverse backgrounds and life experiences. That includes students graduating at the end of spring semester 2025 or later. It includes students who major in journalism, digital storytelling and other relevant majors. Continue reading

New article by Knight Center director on international press coverage of religious freedom

A madrassah in Uzbekistan

The Conversation has published Knight Center director Eric Freedman’s latest article on how the international press covers – and fails to cover – constraints on freedom of religion and faith.

“Religious freedom is routinely curbed in Central Asia but you won’t see it making international news” is drawn from a research project Freedman conducted with professorial assistant Eleanor Pugh of the MSU Honors College. The results of their study were presented at the August 2024 conference of the Association for Education in Journalism & Mass Communication.

The Conversation is a nonprofit independent news service that publishes articles by academic experts written for the general public and edited by a team of journalists.

This is Freedman’s sixth article for The Conversation, two of which were translated into French and Indonesian.

Bridging identities and science: SCIP Workshop brings together scientists from diverse backgrounds to transform science communication

Workshop participants discuss and activity

Photo credits: Therese Iacono for SCIP

By Iasmim Amiden dos Santos

The Knight Center for Environmental Journalism and the Metcalf Institute at the University of Rhode Island (URI) organized a workshop on inclusive and culturally responsive science communication for the third and final cohort of fellows in the SciComm Identities Project (SCIP). Held from January 6 to 10 at the University of Rhode Island’s main campus in South Kingstown, the workshop trained 14 fellows from diverse cultural and disciplinary backgrounds who share a strong commitment to science communication and inclusive community engagement.

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