SPONSORED BY FIRE’S STUDENT PRESS FREEDOM INITIATIVE (SPFI)

The fall semester is just around the corner, and for the next several weeks I’ll be keeping an eye out for your back-to-school and orientation issues for an online library I’m building for future reference.

If you end up putting out an issue you’re proud of this month — and who among you won’t! — send it my way by replying to this newsletter or emailing [email protected].

On to this week’s news and resources!

SPONSOR MESSAGE

Student journalists shouldn’t have to fight censorship alone. FIRE’s Student Press Freedom Initiative (SPFI) defends student reporters nationwide with free legal resources, a 24-hour hotline, and expert advocates ready to help when your rights are under threat. 

SPFI offers helpful resources to student journalists at colleges and universities on subjects like press freedom, the First Amendment, libel and defamation, privacy law, and intellectual property. Learn more about the guidance and support available to your newsroom.

Raising my eyebrows in Colorado’s general direction: Aurora Community College student journalist accuses college of ‘unconstitutional gag order’ and Aurora college denies restricting speech amid controversy over student news site

Interesting twist for your sports desk — 400 colleges are on track to offer women’s flag football by 2027.

I missed this in July, but the U.S. Government Accountability office issued a report that found most DI and DII schools spend more on athletics than they bring in in revenue. You can also always check the Knight-Newhouse College Athletics Database to learn more about your (public) school’s sports dollars.

Trying to raise money for your student news operation? Trusting News has this piece with great tips on effective asks. From author/researcher Volha Kananovich of Appalachian State University: “The practical takeaway is not that newsrooms need to become more aggressive salespeople. It’s that they need to make a clearer, more specific and more honest case for support.”

Speaking of financial longevity in student media, big news from the University of Georgia’s independent student newspaper: The Red & Black Announces Sale of Baxter Street Property to Strengthen Organization’s Future

And finally, one more from Georgia to potentially share with your entrepreneurial students: Meet the Gen Z journalist who bought his hometown newspaper in Georgia

Each week I search for great collegiate journalism by scanning the RSS feeds of student newspapers from across the country. These are my favorites from the last week. If you’ve got a great student media story, email it to me at [email protected].

Noisy neighbors: The experience of living next to a data center (The Collegiate, Grand Rapids Community College)

Hidden in plain sight: Human trafficking in Fort Worth (TCU 360, Texas Christian University)

A first-year student's guide to following Colorado State Football in 2026 (The Rocky Mountain Collegian, Colorado State University)

Amazon proposes building over 800,000 square feet of data centers on GW's Virginia campus (The GW Hatchet, George Washington University)

Rising transportation costs create new challenges for College of DuPage commuters (The Courier, College of DuPage)

New UMN housing policy prevents student workers from doing homework on the job (The Minnesota Daily, University of Minnesota)

Cal Poly housing expansion relies on $3.3 million in prison-made furniture (Mustang News, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo)

NU's legal stance on tenure in case involving late Feinberg Prof. Jane Wu alarms faculty leaders (The Daily Northwestern, Northwestern University)

Campus police arrest individual found allegedly living in science lab (The Beacon, William Paterson University)

The Center for Ethical Leadership in Media at the University of Texas has a great new YouTube short to share with your students and recent grads: How to Handle Conflict Resolution in Digital Spaces, designed by Christina Bellantoni, director of the USC Annenberg Media Center. These CELM resources are designed to meet students and early-career journalists where they live, work and worry. (They are so good!) Others include:

The most recent Journalism Salute podcast features three reporters from the San Francisco Chronicle who won the 2026 Pulitzer Prize for explanatory reporting. The three provided behind-the-scenes perspectives on the 20-story project, “Burned,” which shows “how insurance companies using algorithmic tools have failed Californians who lost their homes to wildfires.”

TRAINING HELP

“Before Your Byline” is a one-hour video course for beginning journalism students — designed to equip first-time newsroom staffers with a basic understanding of newsgathering, interviewing, story structure, law and ethics.

They can take the course asynchronously and at their own pace, freeing up student editors and advisers to concentrate on their newsrooms’ unique teaching needs. Learn more and demo the first chapter for free.

I’ve been making travel plans to begin working with the three schools selected for the Student Media Sustainability Project, which kicks off this month.

I’ll be traversing the midwest, so if you’re in Michigan, Indiana or Illinois and want to show off your program, let me know via email and let’s talk about squeezing in a visit!

Have a great week out there!