later this month, they\u2019ll be starting on an incredible journey to learn, practice and network. A few days, bylines and karaoke-filled nights later, they\u2019ll join the ranks of the 200 hand-picked students who have covered 12 conferences since 2003, many of them now doing some amazing work in digital media.<\/span><\/p>\nWe have strong evidence to back that up. With ONA\u2019s blessing, I dug a bit into the alumni and crunched some data to get a snapshot of who they are and where they are now. The result is like a mini-road map of career development in digital journalism. <\/span><\/p>\nFull disclosure:<\/strong> I was one of these alum (Class of 2010, represent). If you are, as well, you are most likely included in our research, which involved a look at your LinkedIn profile and data compiled from information publicly accessible online. (Most everyone was easy to find, many on a few platforms; some were not.)<\/span><\/p>\nHere\u2019s a tip-of-the-iceberg look at “where they are now\u201d:<\/span>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n\n- The largest portion of alumni work for journalism organizations. <\/b>While some work in communications and other careers outside of journalism, at least 93 alumni work directly for a journalism shop, such as the Austin-American Statesman or an online-only site like Mashable. Others do freelance work, many with news organizations, though a notable number freelance through more general media consulting. Communication jobs at businesses and non-profits also are marginally represented in this group.<\/span><\/li>\n
- A small but impressive subset work for technology companies. <\/b>Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Medium, Storify, Hubspot and Twitter are on a few resumes.<\/span><\/li>\n
- Most alumni employed at news outlets work for newspapers (about 40 percent), 25 percent work in TV, and 14 percent work at online-only publications. <\/b>Magazines were less frequent, as were wires.<\/span>
\n<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\nSome more specific examples and job titles:<\/span><\/p>\n\n- The New York Times<\/em>: Ashley Southall, (Newsroom ’07, Howard University) is a <\/span>breaking news reporter. <\/span><\/i>Jeremy Merrill, (Newsroom ’11, Claremont McKenna College) is <\/span>an interactive news developer. <\/span><\/i>Brian Hamman,(Newsroom ’04, University of Missouri) is <\/span>Director of Development, New Digital Products<\/span><\/i>.<\/span><\/li>\n
- Washington Post<\/em>: Matthew Nelson (Newsroom ’11, Drake University) is a <\/span>front-end developer<\/span><\/i>. Frank Yankof (Newsroom ’11, Kent State University) is a <\/span>homepage producer<\/span><\/i>. Caitlin Dewey (Newsroom ’10, Syracuse University) is a <\/span>digital culture critic<\/span><\/i>.<\/span><\/li>\n
- NPR:\u00a0<\/em>Eric Athas (Newsroom ’07, UMass-Amherst) is \u200e<\/span>senior digital news specialist<\/span><\/i>\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n
- The Huffington Post:<\/em> Ethan Klapper (Newsroom ’10, American University) is <\/span>global social media editor\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/li>\n
- The Texas Tribune:\u00a0<\/em>Annie Daniel (Newsroom ’13, University of North Carolina) is a <\/span>news apps developer<\/span><\/i><\/li>\n
- The Pew Charitable Trusts<\/em>: Jevonya Hughes (Newsroom ’08, Norfolk State University) is <\/span>senior associate of digital analytics<\/span><\/i><\/li>\n
- While there are a number of new web job titles, “reporter” still rules. <\/b>That title was far more common than expected from this digital group. Consulting \/ freelancing \/ running own thing also turned up frequently.<\/span><\/li>\n
- Two alum ended up as ONA board members. <\/b>Juana Summers, (Newsroom ’08, Mashable) and Will Sullivan (Newsroom \u201803,<\/span> 18F).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Last, here are quick demographics:<\/p>\n
\n- 70 schools are represented. <\/b>University of California, Berkeley is the most represented, followed by the University of Southern California, Ohio University and American University, and schools that were located near the conference in a particular year, such as Ryerson University in Canada. More than half of the schools represented had only one student cover the conference.<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
- Student journalists have come from universities in 23 states and three countries. <\/b>Students have join the newsroom from France, Finland and Canada. California alma maters are the most represented, followed by New York, Maryland and Ohio.<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
- There are nearly three times as many women as men. <\/b>Our tally is 143 women and 57 men.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0All in all, a remarkable track record, one that points to a healthy present and future for digital journalism.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/a>And, of course, in true newsroom spirit, we\u2019ll hand this dataset over to the Student Newsroom participants at ONA15 — with many thanks to Google, whose five-year sponsorship has allowed support and resources for the students to grow exponentially.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nKevin Loker is a very proud ONA10 Student Newsroom alum. He is program manager of the American Press Institute, a nonprofit organization that conducts research, convenes leaders and creates tools to advance journalism. He works with the center\u2019s research, training projects and in-person events, contributing to API original research and working with the center\u2019s consultants and fellows.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you\u2019re a Student Newsroom alum headed to ONA15 in Los Angeles, hit us up ahead of time. We\u2019re planning a get-together for beer, catching up and to help us think through how best to connect all of the great \u201cgraduates\u201d in the future. Feel free to contact me at kevin.loker@pressinstitute.org. _______________________________________ When the 20 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"start_time":0,"end_time":0,"moderators":[],"hashtag":[],"soundcloud":[],"scribble":[],"viafoura":[],"youtube":[],"vimeo":[],"facebook":[],"trint":[],"slideshare":[],"livestream":[],"resources":[],"video_embed":[],"first_name":"","last_name":"","title":"","organization":"","website":"","twitter":"","_sponsor_url":"","_sponsor_tagline":"","_sponsor_level":"","spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[2,154],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paaWsA-dGi","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52594"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52594"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52594\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62235,"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52594\/revisions\/62235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ona15.journalists.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}