This semester, the Indiana Daily Student added two city reporter positions to the news desk and sophomore Joey Bowling and junior Ty Vinson were selected to specifically cover the Bloomington community.
The move comes after the city reporter positions received funding from the Media School at Indiana University.
Bowling covers city politics, homelessness, and addiction, while Vinson covers city life, which includes business, transportation, and education.
“Having two people specifically dedicated to covering things that aren’t on campus forces us to look at what’s going on in the community, even though we’re only here for four years,” Vinson said.
“With different news outlets closing down across the country, sometimes a community becomes a news desert where they’re not able to have the information they truly need,” Bowling added. “It’s just another step forward in the fact that the IDS has always been a community paper, but now it’s expanding more into the Bloomington community.”
Although the reporters will be working on specific beats, Bowling emphasized the importance of listening to the community for any coverage they would like to see from the IDS. Vinson added in his agreement to this thought.
“I think people will reach out to us more and let us know when there are stories that should be reported on or what’s not being reported on enough,” Vinson said. “I really do see us becoming the city’s paper.”
