Editorial: An experiential education benefits students

Moving a small city’s newspaper into the basement of a local college’s dorm building…Moving a small city’s newspaper into the basement of a local college’s dorm building doesn’t sound ideal. A place where reporters have to contend with rowdy freshmen three stories above doesn’t exactly smack of “educational innovation” at first.

However, according to a recent article in The New York Times, Mercer University in Macon, Ga., has launched a program called the Center for Collaborative Journalism. It hopes the project will ameliorate some of the problems of its financially struggling local paper and radio station while helping students gain more hands-on reporting experience.

The Telegraph — the city’s local paper — and the city’s radio station have moved their offices onto Mercer’s campus. Students, with guidance from program directors and professors, will assist with reporting. According to the article, they will help “fill in the gaps” of a short-staffed newspaper and radio station.

The Times article says those who designed the program tried to model it after the medical residency model, in which everyone should benefit: the students from being in an atmosphere of work and study, the professionals from the students’ contribution, and the community from a higher level of involvement and a better product.

We applaud this university’s attempt to give its students a high degree of quality, hands-on experience. Especially in fields like journalism, having skills other than those learned in the classroom is essential to finding a job after graduation. We are also in favor of the college’s attempt to revitalize local news in the town, creating a more vibrant atmosphere for the students to work in.

We find this model especially interesting because, while job-specific skills can be gained through internships, we think that a model where students are guided by professors throughout the process could lead to even greater benefits. Also, students’ experiences at the Center for Collaborative Journalism will presumably last for a longer period of time than typical summer internships.

Although we are in favor of Mercer’s journalism center, we believe that the model does have some flaws — namely, that students will be filling in the gaps of small staffs and will not be paid.

But we are in favor of any university’s attempt to assist students in gaining practical experience in their fields of study. In our experience, it is often extremely difficult for students — who often lack professional connections — to do all the legwork of finding an internship or job on their own, especially in a very competitive field.

We strongly support universities’ attempts to aid students in finding experiences such as undergraduate engineering co-ops and internships like the ones offered at Mercer’s Center for Collaborative Journalism. Pitt’s recent promise to help undergraduates find internships after completing a course is a start.. Hopefully, opportunities such as these will continue to grow as colleges realize that a bachelor’s degree no longer speaks for itself.