Beyond The Beacon: Internship and fellowship news

Exciting opportunities await graduating seniors Austin De Dios (editor-in-chief) and Carlos Fuentes (copy editor/sr. reporter), as well as next year’s News and Managing Editor Kate Cuadrado, a rising junior.

Austin was chosen for a fellowship through the Oregonian/Oregon Live, where he will join staff as a breaking news reporter. As part of the fellowship, Austin will simultaneously be enrolled (tuition-free) in the Master’s journalism program at Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications.

Austin De Dios

Carlos Fuentes will focus on business reporting as a Dow Jones News Fund intern at the Portland Business Journal this summer.

Carlos Fuentes

Kate Cuadrado will report for The Portland Tribune as an intern though the Charles Snowden Program for Excellence in Journalism.

Kate Cuarado

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Internships – Summer 2020

Two now-former Beacon staffers who graduated in May are interning as reporters at two Oregon publications this summer.

Former News and Managing Editor Maddie Pfeifer is reporting for The Portland Business Journal.

Former Opinion Editor Dora Totoian, selected through the Charles Snowden Program for Excellence in Journalism, is reporting for the McMinnville News Register.

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Hannah Sievert appointed 2018-19 editor-in-chief

Hannah Sievert, a junior from Gig Harbor, Wash will be editor-in-chief of The Beacon during the 2018-19 academic year.
Photo by Annika Gordon

University President Fr. Mark Poorman has appointed Hannah Sievert editor-in-chief of The Beacon for the 2018-2019 academic year.

Sievert, a junior, currently serves as living editor for The Beacon and has worked for the publication since her freshman year. She applied in her first few weeks at UP and found it a great way to integrate herself into the UP community and learn more about it. Though the Beacon newsroom is a demanding environment, Sievert considers it an excellent fit.

“It’s just such a fun job where you get to meet people, and I love writing, so it’s doing what I love,” Sievert said. “I can’t imagine having another job.”

She also said she has especially enjoyed the community aspect of working at The Beacon and is indebted to mentors throughout the years who have invested time and effort into teaching her and other people. She plans to prioritize maintaining the strong sense of camaraderie next year as well as continue to improve The Beacon’s online presence. Keeping the high standards of excellence to which many of its readers hold it is a goal for next year, Sievert said, which she plans to accomplish by recruiting competitive applicants and focusing on training staff.

Sievert enjoys the opportunity to write stories that might otherwise get overlooked and thinks it’s crucial for The Beacon to accomplish that at a UP level.

“Storytelling is connecting people, showing parts of the human experience, (through) stories that just make you cry because there’s just something about them,” Sievert said.

Last summer, she interned at Artslandia Publishing, where she was involved in the magazine production process and said she learned a lot about Portland through writing about it. This summer, she will further develop her journalism skills as an intern with the Charles Snowden internship program at The Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon.

Nancy Copic, Beacon advisor and assistant director of student media at UP, said that the internship will be an invaluable professional journalism experience for Sievert where her skills will serve her well and where she can further grow them.

“(Sievert) has intentionally challenged herself through stories that were just beyond her skill level. And I think that’s an inspiration to other students who will learn from her…I think it’s powerful in motivating the other students,” Copic said. “Hannah is a very positive person. I’m excited to see how she builds community in the newsroom and beyond.”

Sievert’s first act as editor-in-chief was appointing reporter Claire Desmarais as news and managing editor for next year.

The Presidential Advisory Committee on Student Media recommended Sievert to Poorman, who affirmed the decision.

“We recommended Hannah because of the outstanding job she has done this year as living editor,” Leykam said in an email to The Beacon. “We’re also excited to see her ideas in the areas of staff meeting improvement, promoting awareness of The Beacon to incoming freshmen, and inspiring/incentivizing staff come to fruition in 2018-19.”

Sievert will succeed Rachel Rippetoe, who will graduate in May.

“She (Sievert) has a natural leadership ability that’s both authoritative and approachable,” Rippetoe said. “She’s also a great writer, and she comes up with some really unique and creative stories to tell. I think she will be a great motivator for staff next year, and that’s really a big part of the job, just inspiring students who have a million other things to do to be a contributing part of The Beacon community.”

-Dora Totoian

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Internships and beyond

Several Beaconites who graduated last May and some of this year’s seniors spent the summer interning in media jobs. Here’s rundown of what they did in their internships and what they’re doing now.

2016-17 Editor-in-Chief Malika Andrews interned as a sports reporter (a James Reston Fellow) at the New York Times. It went so well , she’s still there.

Last year’s Managing Editor Clare Duffy interned as a reporter at the Portland Business Journal and was asked to stay an additional nine months to fill in for award-winning reporter Matt Kish, now on a fellowship at Columbia University.  Clare is now covering Nike, Adidas, Under Armour, banking, finance and more.

She also has been interviewed on KGW News about stories she’s written on Nike’s recent layoffs and the arrest of an Adidas executive accused in an NCAA scandal involving alleged payoffs to collegiate athletic recruits.

Former Beacon Sports Editor Ben Arthur was a summer intern at the Denver Post, and is now part of the Seattle Times’ team covering Husky football (University of Washington).

Ben was also selected to be part of the student newsroom at the National Association of Black Journalists’ (NABJ) convention in New Orleans in August, where he won an award for his Beacon story about UP soccer player Benji Michel. 

Ben recently spoke on a panel in an NABJ webinar about advice on internships. You can listen here.

Former Beacon Sports Editor Ben Arthur (near the middle, wearing black slacks and gray shirt) with other members of the NABJ Student Multimedia Project, which covered stories from the group’s national convention in New Orleans in August.

2017-18 Beacon Editor-in-Chief Rachel Rippetoe was a reporter intern at the Eugene Register-Guard as part of the Charles Snowden Program for Excellence in Journalism.

Rachel covered a wide variety of news and feature stories. She was also one of two of the 18 interns in the Snowden program to win the Ethics Award.

Working through case studies on journalism ethics with a mentoring editor is a hallmark of the Snowden program. The word on Rachel is that she went beyond the theoretical cases and initiated conversations on ethics as actual situations came up in the newsroom and in her reporting.

This year’s News and Managing Editor Olivia Sanchez spent the summer reporting for the Portland Tribune.  Olivia covered everything from DACA to water quality along the Willamette to mermaids. (Yes, mermaids!)

All that Olivia learned at the Tribune is coming in handy as she leads The Beacon’s news coverage.

2017-18 Senior Beacon Reporter and Multimedia Producer Rachel Ramirez  (front row, third from left) was one of just 15 collegiate journalists selected nationwide to be part of the VOICES program, a team of student journalists chosen to attend  and receive mentoring at the national convention of the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA)  in Philadelphia. Here’s Rachel’s video project on refugees, which she produced for the program.

Rachel was also a writing intern for Multnomah County government over the summer, and is now interning at Oregon Business magazine, in addition to her Beacon duties.

Hannah Sievert, editor of Living Photo by Annika Gordon

Hannah Sievert, now a junior and The Beacon’s Living editor,  interned at Artslandia magazine. 

This year’s (and last year’s) Community Engagement Editor Erin Bothwell did a marketing internship with Chamber Music Northwest. Erin runs social media for The Beacon and also writes the weekly email newsletter.

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SO proud of our Snowden Interns

Last summer, Clare Duffy and Cheyenne Schoen were among a select group of student journalists from Oregon who worked as interns through the Charles Snowden Program for Excellence in Journalism. Clare was a reporter for The Bulletin in Bend, and Cheyenne worked at the Klamath Falls Herald and News. I heard rave reviews about them at a recent reception honoring all of the interns. Clare literally was the poster girl for the group. Cheers to these up-and-coming soon-to-be professionals!

-Nancy Copic, Ass’t Director for Student Media

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Awards and Internships, Spring 2016 edition

The Beacon has won four regional Mark of Excellence Awards from the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) and advances to the national competition in the following categories:

General News Reporting, In-Depth Reporting, Online Sports Reporting and Photo Illustration.

Here are the specifics:

General News Reporting: “Students Safe After Paris Attacks” by Clare Duffy, Malika Andrews and Luke Loranger

(Finalist: “Faculty to Admin:I’m underpaid” by Cheyenne Schoen, Clare Duffy and Malika Andrews)

In-Depth Reporting: “Transgender student finds a home/Transphobic Incident Spurs Pain, Action” by Cheyenne Schoen and Lydia Laythe

Online Sports Reporting: “His Way Out” by Malika Andrews, Hannah Baade and Parker Shoaff

Photo Illustration: “Are We Prepared?” by Nathan DeVaughn and Hannah Baade

(Finalist: “Where Does Your Trash Go?” by Rebekah Markillie)

The regional competition involved student media from universities in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana and Alaska with enrollment under 10,000. National winners will be announced at the SPJ convention in New Orleans in September.

Also, the College Media Association awarded The Beacon Second Place in the Apple Awards for Best Newspaper from schools with fewer than 5000 students. First Place went to Rice University’s student newspaper.

Malika, Cheyenne, Ben and Clare with the award at the College Media Convention in New York

Additionally, several Beacon staffers have landed selective media internships this summer.

Malika Andrews will intern at the Denver Post as part of the elite Sports Journalism Institute. The Charles Snowden Program for Excellence in Journalism has awarded paid internships to Clare Duffy (The Bend Bulletin) and Cheyenne Schoen (Klamath Falls Herald and News). Ben Arthur will intern for the sports department of KOIN-TV (CBS).

Go team!

– Nancy Copic, Asst. Director for Student Media

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Did not see this coming…Hurray!

When I saw the email subject line “Gold Circle Winners Announced,” my reflex was to steel myself for disappointment. My expectations could not have been lower.

Gold Circle Awards are national awards from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association based at the graduated school of the Columbia School of Journalism in N.Y. There are so many better-funded, impressively-staffed college journalism programs and student media programs out there, I believed The Beacon could maybe score an honorable mention. At best.

Not that I don’t swell with pride over the work of the students journalists at The Beacon. I obviously had enough faith to enter The Beacon’s work. It’s just that, well, our little Beacon, we’re not really in the major leagues.

Are we?

The email revealed the surprising (to me, at least) answer: Yes, at least in 6  awards categories.

Six awards and three certificates of merit (honorable mention). Did I mention these are national awards?

So… drumroll, please, I am thrilled to announce The Beacon won the following Gold Circle Awards:

Editorial Writing- 2nd place: Caitlin Yilek and Rosemary Peters- “Where are all the women?”

Personal Opinion: On-campus issues- 3rd place: Caitlin Yilek- “Breaking my silence”

Personality Profile- 2nd Place: Laura Frazier- “Impossible is Nothing”

Certificate of Merit: Natalie Wheeler- Homeless teen turned UP student

Overall design:Tabloid format- 2nd place:  Hannah Gray, Rosemary Peters, Elizabeth Tertadian

Page one design,tabloid format -2nd Place: Hannah Gray-“‘Big Bang Theory’ star returns to The Bluff”

Certificate of Merit:Hannah Gray, Rosemary Peters- “Would you pay $6.95 for this?”

Single subject news or feature package, single page, tabloid- 3rd Place: Will Lyons and Shellie Adams- “Netflix Nosedives”

Certificate of Merit: Rosemary Peters – “What’s in our air?”

Where are they now?

Of the eight students who won Gold Circle Awards, four graduated from UP last May:

Former Beacon Editor-in-Chief Rosemary Peters, who was an engineering major at UP, is pursuing her interest in scientific journalism at Imperial College London, where she will earn an master’s in Science Communication.

Former Beacon news editor Hannah Gray does research for a think tank in Washington, D.C.

 Caitlin Yilek is an editorial writer and copy editor for the St. Cloud Times in her home state of Minnesota.

Natalie Wheeler won a Snowden Foundation paid journalism internship, and is currently reporting at the East Oregonian in Pendleton.

Now for the four returning Beacon staffers who won Gold Circle Awards:

Liz Tertadian is editor-in-chief of The Beacon.

Laura Frazier is news editor of The Beacon. She also won a Snowden Foundation internship, and worked as a reporter for the Portland Tribune and Forest Grove News-Times last summer.

 Will Lyons is opinions editor of The Beacon.

 Shellie Adams is design editor of The Beacon.

‘Looking forward to more astonishing achievements from these students and alums!

-Nancy Copic, Ass’t Director of Student Media & adviser to The Beacon

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Cool things happening for Beacon staffers

Rosemary Peters is headed to Imperial College London for a Master’s in Science Communication in the fall. She plans combine her two passions of journalism and science to become a journalist covering scientific issues for the general public.

Jason Hortsch received a Fulbright in Germany.

Natalie Wheeler and  Laura Frazier were chosen for Snowden Program for Excellence in Journalism paid internships. Over the summer, Natalie will report for the East Oregonian in Pendleton. Laura will report for the Portland Tribune and Forest Grove News-Times. Laura also recently won a scholarship from the Oregon Newspaper Foundation.

Jocelyne LaFortune was selected by Fulbright’s Austrian-American Educational Commission to be an English teaching-assistant in Austria.

Liz Tertadian will be in Washington D.C. interning for the Armenian Embassy.

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