By Sarah Senese ’23
Throughout the Fall 2019 semester, Colorado College’s journalism program was publishing with full force. Professor Corey Hutchins’ Block 4 class Advanced Reporting in the Digital Age produced three fully published pieces in Colorado news sources, such as PULP (Pueblo), The Colorado Independent (Denver), and The Colorado Sun (Denver). These students worked in groups to interview, explore, and dig deeply into an issue directly impacting Colorado.
Attesting to the hard work of the students in his class, Hutchins commented on the dedication and hard work of Journalism Institute students: “They took the reporting seriously, and put in many, many hours of outside-the-classroom effort to conduct interviews, report in the field, attend public meetings, dig through documents, and put the news-gathering skills they learned in class into real-life action.”
Don’t just take Hutchins’ word for it, though. Ask John Rodriguez, publisher of PULP, who accepted a group of students’ pitches that would end up filling 16 pages of the January 2020 edition. He boasted about the quality of the CC Journalism students’ work.
“For us and the region, nothing like this has been pulled off, so we were pleasantly surprised that the students went above and beyond what we asked of them,” says Rodriguez.
Original, on-the-ground reporting in local communities is a staple of higher-level CC Journalism Institute classes. It allows students the vital opportunity to explore the areas of this region on a deeper level and to better understand the communities and cultures of which they are a part. The stories they produce not only help them grasp the reality of a journalism profession and begin to resume build, but help local news outlets publish young stories at a time when the local news industry is struggling. “They wowed me with their dedication and their diligence,” says Colorado Independent Managing Editor Tina Griego of the students who reported a story about the local affordable housing debate.
Ale Tejeda ’20 published a piece in the Colorado Independent about a 2020 ballot question asking whether voters should re-introduce wolves to Colorado. The article was one of the top five most-read stories in the publication for three months. Tejeda’s work is another testament to the success of the Journalism Institute and the dedication its students have to getting their work out to readers in the local and regional area, as well as their in focus on community-based, Colorado issues.
Though the journalism students bring a variety of experiences and backgrounds to class, when you go to CC, you live in Colorado Springs. Hutchins, along with institute director and professor of English Steve Hayward, make sure that students in CC’s journalism program understand the importance of staying up to date on local events, and how their voices can help the community know just what’s going on a little better.
Students’ Published Work:
High Hopes in PULP
ADUs in The Colorado Independent
Witches of Manitou in The Colorado Sun
Wolves in The Colorado Independent
