Journalism students selected as finalists for Student Innovation Competition

A team consisting of three OHIO students has been selected as one of nine finalist teams for the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute’s (RJI) annual Student Innovation Competition.

The team includes seniors Sarah Donaldson, a Pittsburgh native studying journalism with a minor in political science and a certificate in social media; Morgan Spehar, from Auburn, Ohio, who is double majoring in journalism and environmental studies in the Honors Tutorial College (HTC) with a minor in history; and Jayne Yerrick, from Uniontown, Ohio, an HTC journalism major with a minor in sociology. The team is tackling the topic of media literacy and will be doing three free events with local Girl Scout troops, teaching them about journalism through hands-on activities.

Donaldson said the team started meeting over Zoom in September to talk about project ideas before putting together a proposal. For the competition, they were challenged to come up with something that would address media literacy in the community and decided to create events for elementary and middle school students.

“We have had to shift our whole event idea because it was dependent on who got back to us and who wanted to hold these media literacy events with us,” Spehar said. “It ended up being mostly Girl Scout troop leaders, so now we’re going to be holding three meetings with these Girl Scout troops from Athens County.”

The team received funding from RJI for the project and will have final judging in March. Donaldson said the team’s goal was to do something educational and accessible for the community.

“I enjoyed this because we had to change our idea many times and I think it’s been cool going through that process of developing it,” Yerrick said.

Donaldson said she has been focused on the hands-on aspect of journalism through student publications and internships, but the project provided a new experience.

“This has been both cool and challenging because I kind of stepped back and looked at an issue in journalism and tried to come up with a way to target that issue,” she said.

Dr. Eddith Dashiell, director of the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism, said the team’s accomplishment represents the key components of journalism education.

“Media literacy, community engagement and experiential learning are key components of a quality journalism education, and this year's team combined all three to create a plan innovative enough to be listed among the finalists in this nationally recognized competition,” Dashiell said.