montanajournalism Awards, Feature, J-School, Montana Kaimin, Student

UM Junior, Kate Shea Wins Dow Jones News Fund Internship

One phone call completely changed Kate Shea’s summer plans. She had been preparing for an international reporting trip to Berlin, Germany, when she received a call from the Dow Jones News Fund offering her a paid copy-editing internship for the same period.

While the decision to go to Texas instead was a hard one, Shea admitted, “I’m kind of a copy nerd.”

photo of Kate Shea
“In journalism, there’s still a bias against women, and women face different expectations where their looks are more important than their reporting ability,” Shea said. Photo by Jana Wiegand.

Shea currently works as the copy chief at the Montana Kaimin, UM’s weekly student-run newspaper. At her high school in Helena, Mont., she was one out of two students who worked on both their newspaper and their yearbook.

Assistant Professor Joe Eaton, recognized her drive and talent as soon as she entered the J-School. “Pretty much from Day One here it was clear that Kate was going to take on the world,” he said.

In News Editing class last fall, Eaton encouraged Shea to apply for the Dow Jones internship and take their editing test, which Shea described as “the SAT for copy editors.”

The internship will take Shea to Austin, Texas for a ten-day training program about the specific Dow Jones style of copy-editing before she enters the newsroom at The Corpus Christi Caller Times.

While Shea enjoys the journalism world, she ultimately wants to go to law school and delve into another field that will allow her to effect change in the world.

Her passion for politics comes from interning with Sen. John Tester (D-Mont.) in high school, as well as from her experience winning the Distinguished Young Woman of Montana award in 2013. In Mobile, Alabama, Shea met the winners from other states—all very well-rounded, intelligent and well-spoken women, she said, and she wants to make their voices heard.

“In journalism, there’s still a bias against women, and women face different expectations where their looks are more important than their reporting ability,” Shea said. “Sometimes you hear things like women should be on the cops beat because men will talk to pretty girls.”

However, Shea said that’s never been the case at the Montana Kaimin and that “there’s no gender bias there.” And while the Kaimin keeps her busy, especially with the switch to a weekly, more magazine-style publication, she said it’s been a great experience.

“I thought about moving out of state for college,” Shea said. “But there’s a top-ten journalism program right here in Montana.”

UM immediately recognized Shea’s strength as a leader even when she applied to the program, awarding her the Presidential Leadership Scholarship in 2013.

“She’s a very talented and hard-working journalist. I’m sure that showed through in her application,” Eaton said. For him it was no surprise when Dow Jones offered Shea the copy-editing internship. “She’s going to do a great job.”

By Jana Wiegand
montanajournalism Awards, J-School, Student

UM Journalism Student Ranks Among Top 20 Hearst Finalists

University of Montana School of Journalism photography student Evan Frost placed among the top 20 finalists in the national Hearst Journalism Awards Photo One Competition.

Frost’s portfolio placed 18th in the Photojournalism I: News and Feature Photography category. UM journalism professors Keith Graham and Jeremy Lurgio said they knew Frost’s work was worthy of placing among the best students in the nation.

Pictured: a winning photo from Frost's portfolio. Pikunii Express team members try to gain control of one of their horses as a member of team whitecap takes off during the Indian Relays at the North American Indian Days in Browning, Montana on July 11, 2015. Photo by Evan Frost
Pictured: a winning photo from Frost’s portfolio. Pikunii Express team members try to gain control of one of their horses as a member of team whitecap takes off during the Indian Relays at the North American Indian Days in Browning, Montana on July 11, 2015. Photo by Evan Frost

“His submission of eight images showed vision, humor, action and impact,” Lurgio said.
Above all they were solid storytelling images.”

Lurgio said Frost was able to put his skills to the test through a summer internship at the Great Falls Tribune.

“That hard work in the professional world rewarded him with a group of solid images that earned him a top-20 finish,” he said. “This is a testament to the importance of the professional internship experiences our students pursue.”

Frost worked as the photo and video editor at the Montana Kaimin during fall semester of 2015, as well as the multimedia editor for the 2016 edition of the Montana Journalism Review. Montana Kaimin adviser and UM journalism Professor Nadia White worked with Frost during fall semester.

“Evan combines a keen eye with a sense of community,” she said. “He’s the kind of student that rolls up his sleeves and gets things done.”

To see Frost’s work and recent projects, visit his website at http://www.evanfrostphoto.com/.

montanajournalism Awards, Graduate, J-School, Student

J-School student finds new opportunity to report from abroad

On December 8th, graduate student Katie Riordan was recognized for her promise as an international correspondent when she received the Overseas Press Club Foundation Scholar Award. The recognition was accompanied by the chance to spend her summer break doing international reporting, through a fellowship at a foreign bureau.

photo of Katie Riordan
Katie Riordan is a graduate student at the University of Montana School of Journalism. Photo by Katy Spence.

Bureaus run by the Associated Press, Reuters, Forbes, the Wall Street Journal or the Global Post are all possibilities for Riordan. Wherever she ends up, it won’t be her first time filing stories from foreign soil.

Riordan completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Colorado Boulder, where she majored in broadcast journalism. Post graduation, she did a few stints at community newspapers in New York City.

In 2012, she left the United States to take a job as an editor at an English language paper in Yemen, which borders Saudi Arabia. Riordan had traveled and lived abroad before, but says the move wasn’t a calculated decision. Her reasons for moving to Yemen reveal a deep wanderlust and interest in other cultures.

“You can read all about it but being there, living there and reporting there is the experience,” Riordan said.

After more than a year at the English language newspaper, Riordan left and began freelancing. Over the course of six months she wrote stories on women’s rights, refugees and migrants and a variety of human interest stories. Her work was published in the Christian Science Monitor, Al Jazeera, the Economist and the Middle East Eye, an online news organization based out of England.

Riordan continues to contribute to the Christian Science Monitor, with an article on Syrian refugees in Somaliland published just days before she received her award.

Freelancing was a challenge at first, but being on the ground in countries of international interest helped her. “It’s hard to build relationships with editors, but once you do and can demonstrate that you can produce work from your location things start to snowball,” she said.

Returning to the U.S., she came to the Environmental Science and Natural Resource Journalism Masters program to hone her reporting skills and develop a specialty in environmental reporting. While Riordan says she misses life abroad, she’s been enjoying her classes and has a story in the upcoming 2016 Montana Journalism Review about tensions between the Department of Defense and reporters in war zones.

Next semester Riordan hopes to supplement her journalism and environmental science coursework with classes in Arabic, in order to build on her language base and improve her eligibility for reporting from the Middle East.

But today, she’s excited at being recognized by the Overseas Press Club, and anticipates a productive summer abroad, wherever in the world it may take her.

“It’s a really prestigious organization, and I’m looking forward to getting back overseas to do some reporting on the ground,” Riordan said.

You can get an advanced read of Riordan’s upcoming story in the Montana Journalism Review here.