College newspaper sweeps up 2 tiny publications in a volley against growing news deserts
Student journalists across the United States have done their bit to cover small town news for years, but a college paper in Iowa is taking a bigger swing at it
With hundreds of U.S. newspaper closings leaving legions with little access to local news, a college newspaper in Iowa has stepped up to buy two struggling weekly publications.
The move by The Daily Iowan, a nonprofit student paper for the University of Iowa, is believed to be a first, though other universities are stepping up to fill America's news void in different ways.
Students will work alongside the papers' existing one- or two-person reporting staffs and put themselves to work covering the small communities of Mount Vernon, Lisbon and Solon, Iowa. The weeklies' owner proposed the buyout to save the publications, which have a combined circulation of 1,900.
“It’s a really great way to help the problem of news deserts in rural areas,” said Sabine Martin, executive editor of The Daily Iowan, who will copy edit stories for one of the papers. She already oversees editorial operations for a school paper whose most recent tax filings show had more than $2 million in net assets.
