By Jocelyn Rockhold
When Marcie Young Cancio founded Amplify Utah, a non-profit dedicated to boosting student journalism in local news, she had her pupils at the front of her mind.
“I started at Salt Lake Community College in the fall of 2018 and then launched this project about two years later,” said Young Cancio. “It was something that grew as a passion project and trying to offer more opportunities for students to be published.”
Amplify Utah, initially funded through the Google News Initiative, facilitated a partnership between Salt Lake Community College and The Salt Lake Tribune, with students also contributing to other papers including the Standard Examiner.
Contributions frequently come from students who are enrolled in the Journalism & Media Writing course, COMM 1130, but students who write for the SLCC student newspaper The Globe or students in other related programs, like photography or documentary film, contribute as well.
Student-created stories are submitted and placed in the Amplify Utah repository (the “Story Room”), where outlets like The Salt Lake Tribune can pick up pieces to publish. Those who write an article that is featured in The Salt Lake Tribune or another paper are paid a stipend, with the stipend amount varying depending on the piece.
“It’s not just people wanting to take your work as a student, but valuing it as something that is professional,” said Young Cancio.
The Salt Lake Tribune, the most-read newspaper in the state of Utah and the first non-profit metropolitan daily in the entire country, has published nearly 50 student-written stories since the partnership began. Articles have featured a variety of topics, such as the challenges faced by college food pantries, a swim club that offers a community for local neighborhood youth, and a prison education program benefited by the addition of laptops for its students. The Salt Lake Tribune offers a landing page specifically for student-written stories picked up through Amplify Utah.
“We're not creating anything new, if you will, but we're taking things that are already being done with college journalism programs, with newsrooms,” said Young Cancio, “and we're finding a way to collaborate and to amplify.”
Student voices can also be heard on 90.9fm KRCL, a Utah radio station that broadcasts both music and programming about local affairs. Students who contribute to KRCL take a course in the spring and eventually produce and host a takeover show on the station. Over 26 shows on KRCL have been hosted by SLCC students.
These student contributions are filling an important gap in local news, especially as newsrooms are dwindling in size. Student news from community colleges is vital, as the student body tends to be rich with varying perspective. Salt Lake Community College is the most diverse two-year college in the entire state of Utah.
“How can we as a community benefit from hearing more stories of diversity, equity, inclusion? I like to call it representative storytelling,” said Young Cancio. “It's not representation, but it's more representative of the communities in which we live.”
Programs in Georgia, Texas, Maryland, and Nevada have already reached out to Amplify Utah to speak about creating their own Amplify-inspired partnerships. Communities hoping to start a similar program can check out Amplify Utah’s detailed playbook, which covers everything from start-up to implementation to upkeep.
“How can we create these local hubs of storytelling that help us better understand and amplify voices within our communities [and] learn from them within our hyper local world?” mused Young Cancio. “How can other states across the country publish that work and help us build a better understanding of our country and the broader world around us?”