Tucson, Arizona - Oct. 21, 2013 – The Media Apprenticeship is an exciting partnership between the University of Arizona School of Journalism and two local news organizations. The program began in 2007 as a collaboration between Associate Professor Susan Knight and then-assistant city editor at the Arizona Daily Star, Leslie Newell. The two were seeking ways to make news internships more meaningful for students. “A few years back someone began calling our apprenticeship program ‘an internship on steroids,’ and the description is apt," Knight said. They interviewed dozens of beginning reporters, interns and others about what to provide in classroom lessons that would enhance a student's newsroom experience.
About the Apprenticeship- Students are assigned to work closely with editors, while covering specific beats, typically. They then meet weekly to cover topics such as depth interviewing, dealing with grief and trauma, covering the GLBT community, ethics in newsrooms, and more. The course is rooted in experiential-learning pedagogy, in which students first engage in experience, then share their experiences through writing and discussion, then process through reflection and self-evaluation. The process enables students to think critically about their work and apply what they are learning better in the future.
The journalism students currently taking part in the program include junior Kayla Samoy, senior Sarah-Jayne Simon, second year graduate student Anna Augustowska, Yoohyn Jung and Monique Padia. Samoy is focusing on radio broadcasting and Simon works with the AZPM original show “Arizona Week.” Augustowska is in the professional optional program and her emphasis has been with the AZPM original news website, AZ Illustrated.
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