Student Media, DIGEST to pair with Vanderbilt on fellowship from CMA/Scripps Howard

College Media Adviser, Inc. has awarded a $2,500 fellowship created to address the shortage of qualified African-American journalists for positions within the nation’s commercial newspapers by strengthening the quality and status of collegiate minority newspapers.
CMA has named Derick S. Hackett, director of Student Media Services at Southern University, the inaugural recipient of the CMA/Scripps Howard Advising Fellowship.
“It is wonderful that CMA and Scripps Howard is investing their energy and time preparing minority journalist to enter the workforce,” said Hackett.
The fellowship is designed to provide advisers direct training, an enduring support network, and lend the prestige and awareness necessary to recruit new HBCU faculty and staff to student media advising.
“Our goal in this program is to help HBCUs overcome issues that may be holding them back from achieving their full potential by providing immediate solutions that are beneficial,” said Chris Carroll outgoing president of CMA and director of Student Communications at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn.
According to Hackett, the problems that plague most minority newspapers and HBCU college publications are inadequate funding, outdated equipment, lack of administrative support, and untrained advisors.
“The lack of blacks and other minorities in the professional field of journalism is alarming considering the high number of students at HBCUs who are enrolled in journalism programs,” said Hackett.
Hackett and editors of the DIGEST will participate in a weeklong exchange program with Vanderbilt University in the spring. This project was designed to intensively train advisers using veteran CMA members.
“We choose to network with Vanderbilt because their student media program produces a successful bi-weekly publication and that is what we are aiming to do beginning in the fall of 2002,” said Hackett.
“There is a lot of things we can learn from each other,” said Carroll. We are looking forward in learning how Southern University deals with issues that arise on their campus and the ethics they use in covering stories.
Carroll and Hackett also plan to take advantage of the resources at the First Amendment Center in Nashville as well as other media programs at Tennessee State University and Fisk University.
“The DIGEST is one of the top up and coming student newspapers in the country and this fellowship will help take Southern’s publication to the next level,” said Dr. Louise Ritche, Executive Director of the Black College Communications Association. “Southern should be printing twice a week with all the strong news content that the paper has.”
CMA has over 2,800 members representing institutions across the US and Canada, seeking solutions, observing the student media marketplace, and discovering trends and networking with students and advisors.
At the last CMA meetings in New Orleans, three DIGEST staff members also interviewed for internships with major newspapers in Kentucky, Dallas, Houston, Monroe, La., and New Orleans.