Editor & Publisher article spotlights Unleashed

By Cynthia Mitchell
As Teen Sections Get Axed, One Returns in Washington

The following article, written by Central Washington University journalism professor Cynthia Mitchell, was published Sept. 2, 2009, by Editor & Publisher, a journal covering the newspaper industry in North America. It spotlights the return of Unleashed — through a partnership between the Yakima Herald-Republic and Educational Service District 105 — this fall. Visit Editor & Publisher for more information.

ELLENSBURG, Wash. The Yakima Herald-Republic’s award-winning teen section, which like several other such sections around the country was killed earlier this year for economic reasons, is coming back this fall thanks to a cooperative arrangement with schools and school districts in Central Washington.

The schools will provide $11,500 a year to pay a part-time coordinator and to pay student contributors and related expenses. The reincarnated “Unleashed” will publish on the front of the “Life in the Northwest” section every other Sunday, with pieces also carried elsewhere and on other days, according to Publisher Michael Shepard.

“Unleashed” had been published weekly since 1999 with the guidance of a Yakima Herald staffer, who supervised between 25 and 40 students from the region. Last fall, the newspaper opted to stop publishing the dedicated page on Tuesdays and instead started using the content throughout the paper and putting it online. But come late February, it was too expensive to continue at all, Shepard said. (Besides the coordinator’s time and newsprint costs, the paper was paying $10,000-$12,000 a year for the student staff and editors, he said.)

“The decision to curtail the program … wasn’t easy,” he said. “But because we were trimming staff, we didn’t feel as though we could devote a significant portion of someone’s time to that program, which was a chunk of money. We needed to recapture those dollars, in addition to being able to recapture a lot of that space.”

But the decision was met with a big response – not just from teens and “Unleashed” alums, but by area educators and readers of all ages, Shepard said. “It certainly wasn’t stunning, or news to us, that it was popular, but so many people took the time to write letters to the editor and to express concern and ask what they could do about it,” Shepard said. “It was more popular in the community than we had thought.”

Meanwhile, Ben Soria, then-superintendent of the Yakima School District, and Jane Gutting, superintendent of Educational Service District 105, a regional agency that provides services for school districts in Central Washington, decided to approach the paper about helping “Unleashed” return. Armed with a budget from Shepard, Gutting then got 11 school districts and two private high schools to agree to kick in money. Most are donating $500 each, with the intention that one of their students will be selected for the “Unleashed” staff. Two larger school districts are donating more money to fund more students.

Of the $11,500 pledged for this school year, $6,000 will go to pay the part-time coordinator. The rest will be used to buy food for the monthly meetings, to pay the student staff of 23 $15 for each story, photo or illustration that’s published, and to buy supplies and cover any other related training costs. Gutting’s agency is also applying for grants from local organizations to help underwrite the program, and the Herald-Republic has pledged to push for new advertising.

“The district superintendents were very open because they know it’s a great opportunity for students to connect with journalism staff and it was a very reasonable fee that we were charging for their participation,” Gutting said.

ESD 105 has set it up as a cooperative with a written contract, automatically renewable yearly, with a five-member executive committee, three of whom are picked by the participating schools, she said. The newspaper will make all publication and editorial decisions, and retains publication rights over the content. (Though students own their work and are free to have it published in non-competing markets.) The staff is recruited and selected by the coordinator in consultation with the paper and ESD105.

Gutting sees the potential for other newspapers and intermediate service agencies, which most states have in place to support school districts, to copy their model.

Adriana Janovich, a Herald-Republic reporter who’s advised “Unleashed” for the last six years, was contracted to be the coordinator. Unlike in the past, however, her “Unleashed” duties will be over and above her full-time Herald-Republic duties as education reporter.

“I am absolutely thrilled the program is being revived,” Janovich wrote in an e-mail, adding that the section “gives young people a voice. It gives them the chance to share their hopes and dreams and fears and concerns. It gives them an opportunity to be published, share their work, have a byline, and build their confidence…They get to experience freedom of the press. And they learn that with freedom comes responsibility…I believe ‘Unleashed’ changes lives.”

Teen sections around the country have been struggling, with several sections closing in the past year, according to Marina Hendricks, manager of the Newspaper Association of America Foundation, which supports teen sections with an annual conference, awards and training, among other things. (‘Unleashed’ took first place in Program Excellence for newspapers under 60,000 circulation in last year’s NAA Foundation youth competition, with student work taking first in the photograph, news and reviews competitions.)

The NAA Foundation doesn’t have any firm numbers about teen sections; it’s such a moving target that it wouldn’t be a good time to do a national survey, Hendricks said. But she said they know of several teen programs that have recently stopped publication. They include The Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wash., the Tulsa World, The Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk, Va., and the Missoulian in Missoula, Mont.

“These programs have been outstanding ones,” Hendricks said. “From our standpoint, they were doing all the right things.”

While the NAA hasn’t put out any kind of official proclamation, urging newspapers to try to keep the sections, they still believe it’s a good way to lure young readers and to train future journalists. “It’s not worth giving up on yet,” she said. “I think it just calls for being more creative and more patient and more willing to look at the long haul.”

Orlando Sentinel reporter Eloísa Ruano González says she’s so shy she doesn’t think she ever would have contemplated going to journalism school — much less pursuing a reporting career — had a high school teacher not pushed her to apply to “Unleashed” for her junior year in 2000-2001. Her parents, Mexican immigrants, had worked mostly menial-labor jobs, González said, so before “Unleashed” she’d never been around many professionals — except for her teachers.

“’Unleashed’ opened up a door for me. … It was a huge stepping stone,” said González, who returned to the Herald-Republic as an intern after graduating, then was hired on and covered immigration issues until leaving for the Sentinel in December 2007.

“When you’re fragile and you’re in high school, you need a comfort zone. And that’s what Unleashed did — they provided a comfort zone, ironically, to help me get out of my comfort zone.

“The experience I gained that one year clearly stuck with me forever.”

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Cynthia Mitchell (mitchelc@cwu.edu) is a former daily newspaper reporter and editor who is now an associate professor of journalism at Central Washington University, about 40 miles from Yakima. In 2006, she taught a story ideas workshop to the “Unleashed” staff and has twice written recommendations for “Unleashed” to earn awards. She can be reached at 509-963-1063, mitchelc@cwu.edu.

YH-R Unleashing Students’ Work Throughout Newspaper

By SARAH JENKINS
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC

(Unleashed is) the equivalent of a teen who wants to be a doctor getting to work at a hospital for a couple of years. It’s hands-on. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. And for teens who want to make a difference, it’s an opportunity worth taking. …

With the compilation of opportunities, of course, comes responsibility. It’s a responsibility to devote time and energy to your work and develop strong communication with your editor. But most importantly, it’s a responsibility to properly represent your generation. …

— Wyatt Kanyer, a two-year veteran of the Unleashed program and a 2008 Riverside Christian School graduate, attends Texas Christian University

I hope you’ve read the Unleashed section of this newspaper the last two Tuesdays and the special presentation on this page today.

It has been humbling.

Two Tuesdays ago, the 10th Unleashed team of teenagers from throughout the Yakima Valley introduced itself to you. Then last Tuesday, Unleashed team writers, photographers and illustrators gave you the first of a special package celebrating what we started out calling “the youth section” and what it has meant to local teens over the years.

The second part of that special package is presented on the rest of this page and on Pages 6-7D.

Unleashed taught me to swallow my fears and, at times, my pride. I was a timid 16-year-old when I started writing for the section in 2000. I hated asking questions in class. Even though I wanted to empower people by telling their stories, the idea of interviewing strangers horrified me.

Unleashed put my pains at ease, helping me set aside my feelings, particularly my fears.

— Eloísa Ruano González, a former Unleashed member and a 2002 Davis High School graduate, was hired as a full-time reporter at the Yakima Herald-Republic. She is now a reporter at the Orlando (Fla.) Sentinel.

These columns and reminiscences come from just a small sample of the nearly 350 teenagers who have been members of the Unleashed team since the spring of 1999. Yet I have been moved by what an important role the opportunity played in their high school years, and how grateful they are — for the most part, anyway — in having had the opportunity to be a part of the Unleashed team and the Herald-Republic.

But today’s presentation marks not just the official beginning of Unleashed’s 10th year. It also marks a significant change for the team and for our news organization, and so requires an explanation.

From today on, the news stories, columns, photographs and illustrations produced by members of the Unleashed team will become part of the regular pages of the Herald-Republic, integrated throughout the paper’s regular news columns.

That means that beginning Tuesday, you will not find the Unleashed section in the Herald-Republic. Instead, throughout the week you’ll find Unleashed stories, photos and illustrations — perhaps in sports, perhaps in Home Front, perhaps in Business, perhaps even on the front page. All will be identified with the new Unleashed logo. They will also identify the Unleashed team member responsible by school, just as they do now.

The Unleashed team you met two weeks ago will continue to work with coordinator Adriana Janovich and student editor Alyssa Patrick (now a senior at Eisenhower High School in her fourth year on the team), and they will all meet here once a month to eat pizza, develop story ideas and learn more about being professional journalists.

Being a reporter means taking on a responsibility that not all teens have. Deadlines must be met and expectations must be followed. Interviews and photos have certain rules because it’s our job as writers and photographers to relay accurate news to the readers.

— Colleen Fontana, a junior at Davis High School, is in her third year on the Unleashed team

When I met with the team last week to explain this new approach to them, they were excited about the possibility — and a little afraid, I think, of losing some of their identity as a team. But we don’t intend for that to happen.

Instead of being a segregated section of the printed newspaper, we see them being a more integral part of the daily process. And we hope it will be as fun for you as readers as it should be for us as editors.

That’s just the printed paper, of course. Unleashed has also taken its first steps in a pretty exciting online adventure.

The 2008-09 team includes the first-ever Unleashed webmaster (or, as we call him, the Web kid). That’s Ike senior David Brinkman, who comes into the office a couple of days a week to work on unleashed.yakimablogs.com. It’s still a work in progress, but we expect it to grow and follow its own path, just like so many members of the Unleashed team have.

Journalism as a profession requires great intrigue and inquisitiveness. My role as a writer for Unleashed encouraged those innate qualities, so that I became a young woman of questions and curiosity. To this day, these are among my strongest qualities, and among my faults.

— Alexandra Auld, a 2004 Prosser High School graduate, attends the University of Washington

So what’s happening on Tuesdays?

With Unleashed stories, photos and illustrations integrated into the main news sections of the paper, we will be moving the Outdoors section from Thursday to Tuesday.

This will allow us to do a couple of things:

First, it will give more prominence to some great information presented every week by Outdoors editor Scott Sandsberry, other outdoors writers from throughout the Northwest and popular columns by local outdoors enthusiasts Rob Phillips and Ron Graham.

Second, it will allow us to condense the space devoted to sports on what is the slowest sports day of the week.

And you never know. You may even find an Unleashed article in the Outdoors & Sports section.
But just so you know not everything is positive …

One of the most talked about columnists in Unleashed’s tenure was Drew Toop, a four-year veteran of the team and a 2007 graduate of Davis High School, who now attends Washington State University.

When the call went out to Unleashed alumni for columns commemorating the 10th anniversary, Drew — as always — had something different to say. You can read his entire comment in his column at left, but here’s my favorite part:

I sense that features like Unleashed exist in part to encourage young people to get newspaper subscriptions. To write it openly: Unleashed is intended as a commercial.

The problem with this, however, is that it seems the most avid readers of the section are of older generations.

Thank you, Drew. I and the other older generations will remain avid readers.

• Sarah Jenkins is editor of the Yakima Herald-Republic. If you have a question or concern, you can reach her at 577-7703; P.O. Box 9668, Yakima WA 98909; or sjenkins@yakimaherald.com. You can also comment on this column in the “Inside the Newsroom” blog at editor.yakimablogs.com.

The Best Training Ground for Tackling Difficult Stories

By ELOÍSA RUANO GONZÁLEZ
ORLANDO SENTINEL

I’ve always feared vultures.

Perhaps it’s because of an old family superstition that the carnivorous bird brings death. Albert Hitchcock’s movie “The Birds” may also have been responsible for this bizarre phobia.

Last spring, though, I found myself standing under hundreds of vultures that were ravaging a small town in central Florida. My fears swelled when I discovered a tornado sweeping nearby.

Are the vultures warning me about something? I wondered. I was ready to flee, but it was the residents’ frustrations and my sense of duty to report their problem that kept me grounded.

The vultures were roosting in their neighborhood. They were ripping rooftop shingles, gnawing on rubber linings on car windows and regurgitating their “meals,” and defecating on vehicles, rooftops, sidewalks and trees.

They had been there for years, but the problem amplified when hundreds more joined the roost and residents found little to no options in getting rid of them. People weren’t even allowed to shoo away the federally protected birds, which were also protected by a city ordinance.

Courage and a strong stomach, keys to tackling good stories, kept me there — just like they kept me at an assignment at a national rowing event in Delaware. I didn’t know how to swim and was terrified of large bodies of water, yet I had to write about first-time rowers. After partially plunging into the river and ripping my pants after falling out of a boat while on assignment, I learned that water and humiliation aren’t all that bad.

Unleashed taught me to swallow my fears and, at times, my pride. I was a timid 16-year-old when I started writing for the section in 2000. I hated asking questions in class. Even though I wanted to empower people by telling their stories, the idea of interviewing strangers horrified me.

Unleashed put my pains at ease, helping me set aside my feelings, particularly my fears. I learned to be more confident and interview classmates, teachers and other professionals in the community without hyperventilating.

I’ve carried these lessons with me to each newspaper I’ve worked at, including the Yakima Herald-Republic, where I became the first Unleashed alumna to return as a full-time reporter. I stayed in Yakima for a year and a half before taking a job with the Orlando Sentinel last December.

Not only has Unleashed empowered people by giving them an outlet to share their creativity, experiences and opinions, but it also strengthened me by helping me find the courage to tackle even the most difficult stories.

The toughest part of a reporter’s job is staying calm while interviewing a person whose life has been ripped apart after a tragedy.

Earlier this year at the Orlando Sentinel, I covered a 70-car pileup on a major interstate where nearly 40 people were injured and at least five were killed. Tractor-trailers had overturned and cars were crushed like tin cans.

I ended up sitting on a front porch with a Honduran man who survived the early morning accident after he was ripped out of his van as he was heading to work with friends and relatives. His older brother, though, didn’t survive.

Although the 25-year-old man and his relatives feared they would lose their jobs after suffering fractured bones and sore backs and were unable to work, they were more concerned about finding a way to pay to fly their relative’s body back to Honduras so his four children, ages 10, 8, 7 and 1 1?2, could say goodbye.

It was a difficult story, but an important one to tell. The man wanted to publicly hold state wildlife officials accountable for his brother’s death after they lost control of a fire they ignited several hours before to burn dangerously dry brush near the interstate. And residents wanted to understand what happened that foggy, smoky morning.

It’s the small accomplishments, such as facing water and vulture phobias, that can prepare you for the more important stories, like a 70-car pileup. And programs like Unleashed are the ones that get you there.

— Eloísa Ruano González, a 2002 Davis High School graduate, was the first (and so far, only) former Unleashed student hired as a full-time reporter at the Yakima Herald-Republic. She is now working as a reporter at the Orlando Sentinel in Florida.