Medill has created the Medill Illinois News Bureau, which will provide local news outlets with coverage of the state legislature and government agencies.
Working in partnership with Capitol News Illinois (CNI), Medill graduate and undergraduate journalism students will develop expertise in covering state government, producing stories and multimedia content that will be distributed to news organizations statewide and in bordering states. CNI is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization based in Springfield that is operated by the Illinois Press Foundation. Its vast distribution network includes about 700 newspapers, digital-only news sites and broadcast outlets throughout Illinois and in border state cities such as St. Louis.
“This new Medill Illinois News Bureau is intended to help strengthen coverage of state government at a time when the Statehouse press corps has been depleted and after most newspapers have closed their Springfield bureaus,” said Medill Dean Charles Whitaker. “Medill is stepping up to help fill some of that void, and to provide students with invaluable, real-world experience and classroom expertise covering one of the largest and most complex state governments in the nation.”
A team of Medill students will be based in Springfield during the legislative session and will work out of CNI’s newsroom. When the legislature is not in session, these students will develop enterprise pieces and cover breaking state government news from Chicago.
“Our Capitol News Illinois team is very excited about this partnership with Medill,” said Jeff Rogers, the founding editor of CNI and executive director of the Illinois Press Foundation. “Through its Local News Initiative, Medill and Northwestern University are making a significant push to revitalize community journalism and address the growing number of news deserts in Illinois. Because Capitol News Illinois addresses a news desert at the Illinois Capitol, this is a perfect partnership that will further connect communities statewide to their state government. This is a win for everyone, including the fantastic student journalists at Medill, who will get their work published by newspapers and broadcast outlets throughout the state.”
The program is funded with a grant from the Robert R. McCormick Foundation. The McCormick Foundation is a major supporter of the Medill Local News Initiative, a multi-pronged project aimed at bolstering local news locally and nationally. The initiative includes the Medill State of Local News Project, which tracks the number of news outlets nationally and news desert communities, and programs such as the Medill Local News Accelerator, the Midwest Solutions Journalism Hub and Teach for Chicago Journalism. Program participants also will conduct local news audience research.
“We are glad to have Medill and Capitol News Illinois as partners in keeping our citizens informed about the actions of their government and keeping the State of Illinois accountable to its residents,” said Tim Knight, the president and chief executive officer of the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.
Medill Senior Lecturer Bob Rowley will serve as director of the Medill Illinois News Bureau. Rowley is a former national and foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune, where served as national editor for seven years. Rowley covered state government and local politics early in his reporting career.