The promise and perils of staff/student publications in Australian journalism programmes

Abstract

Once rare, staff-supervised, student-produced publications are now common in Australian journalism programmes. This trend owes something to the consolidation of journalism education, but also much to two intersecting developments: the decline in the scale of the mainstream news media has opened up reporting deserts that journalism programmes, their staffing complements bolstered by journalists who have taken redundancy packages from mainstream outlets, have stepped in to water. This article reports the results of a national survey of journalism educators responsible for staff/student publications and discusses the implications of these publications. The survey respondents report strongly favourable educational outcomes for their students. They also report universities’ tardiness in adequately resourcing the editing and supervision time needed to transform student work submitted for assessment into publishable stories.