A public radio station in Yuma, AZ, has been honored with a significant grant to help teach journalism to college students with a focus on servicing underrepresented communities. Funded by the Community Foundation for Southern Arizona, KAWC has received $15,000 from the Local News Initiative of Southern Arizona.
The money will be used to create a Student Newsroom in collaboration with Arizona Western College, which operates KAWC. This grant is one of six inaugural awards aimed at enhancing local news production, underscoring the importance of local media in providing essential news and fostering the growth of future journalists.
The program plans to offer a summer course producing content around the 2024 election cycle, with a particular emphasis on younger voters. The work produced by the students will be featured across KAWC and KOFA-Border Radio’s broadcasts and digital platforms, including NPR Network podcasts.
KAWC’s News and Operations Director Lou Gum commented, “Local media is best placed to deliver the stories and information a community needs to thrive. KAWC looks forward to helping build a pathway for students to become the next generation of journalists and media professionals in our community.”
AWC Professor of English Trisha Campbell added, “Since I arrived here at AWC four years ago, I have been trying to get some kind of synergy going between my vision for Media Arts and podcasting and the KAWC studio and programming. Once I was able to get the Introduction to Podcasting course off the ground and filled with students, it seemed like the perfect time to start building a co-creation between the college and KAWC.”
