Washington state paper to get biz news content from college students

Gordon Oliver, the business editor of The Columbian in Vancouver, Wash., writes about how the business section is now getting content from journalism students at nearby Clark College.

Oliver writes, “Here’s our arrangement: The Independent’s writers will report and write business-related stories that will be of interest to readers of both newspapers. We’ll edit those stories at The Columbian, and both papers will run the stories on the same day. The Independent is published every other Wednesday during the school year, so readers of The Columbian can expect student-written stories on most or all of those days. The student writers also are discussing writing at least one other set of stories just for The Columbian.

“The collaboration began last week with a story about plans for a new science, technology, engineering and math building on the Clark campus. It gives students an opportunity to work with news professionals and brings more readers to their work. The Columbian’s readers benefit from stories by young writers with fresh story ideas. At our meeting, we talked about ideas for stories about business, careers, and money management; deadlines and editing logistics, and — of course — the state of journalism in the future.

“The college newsroom brought back memories of my own time as a college newspaper journalist, in an era when words were pounded out on typewriters and photographers produced black-and-white photos from film in a darkroom. Print had no rival in those days — we sneered at the quality of television news. Ambitious, talented journalists plotted career paths from small-town dailies to the few metropolitan dailies offering decent salaries.”

Read more here.