High school and college journalists and teachers from across New England converged at the Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication at Franklin Pierce University from July 15-19, 2019. They came for “The Presidency & The Press” summer program, supported by the Granite State News Collaborative.
Melanie Plenda, director of the GSNC, was the Professional-in-Residence for the week. She worked with student reporters to address the week’s theme, “The Intersection of Politics and Press in the 2020 Election.” She introduced the concept of solutions journalism adopted by the GSNC, a collaborative approach by media to delve deeper into successful approaches to issues that are common across communities.
“I’m excited to work on projects I’m passionate about. I love to learn and write about both sides of a controversial issue, and let people decide for themselves what they think,” said Magnolia McComish, a FPU incoming communications/political science major and Fitzwater Scholar.
Participants worked with Franklin Pierce faculty, as well as journalists from WMUR-TV, New Hampshire Public Radio, the New Hampshire Union Leader and Fox News. They made three road trips across New Hampshire. They visited news outlets, the New Hampshire State House, candidate events, and non-partisan policy organizations Citizens Count of New Hampshire and No Labels.
Student journalists experienced a full range of campaign coverage, taking a more active role at each stage. They met Democratic presidential candidate John Hickenlooper in Laconia and met with staffers for candidate Michael Bennett. Later, they joined the press corps to interview audience members and campaign officials at Julian Castro’s Town Hall event in Nashua, according to Dr. Kristen Nevious is the director of the Fitzwater Center and the Presidency & the Press program.
At the end of the week, students wrote and produced a live broadcast, “Meet the Student Press: Solutions & the Presidential Election.”
To learn more about The Presidency & The Press summer program and the Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication, contact Dr. Kristen Nevious at (603) 899-1039.
For more information on GSNC contact Melanie Plenda at Melanie.Plenda@collaborativenh.org.