Hampton University announced last week it’s partnering with the World Wildlife Fund in an effort to support environmental journalism.
One student at Hampton’s Scripps Howard School of Journalism and Communications will receive a $10,000 scholarship toward academic expenses, along with mentorship by the international conservation nonprofit.
“We want to create a pipeline of talent,” said Dean Julia Wilson. “We want our students to be qualified to do anything and everything.”
The new scholarship is part of a wider effort to boost education around science journalism at the historically Black university.
Wilson said that as she started in the position a few years ago, she was reading several national stories about the potential for space travel.
“And I'm thinking, ‘Will diverse journalists be able to cover outer space? Will they know the terminology to use? Will they understand how it works?’” she said.
She also thought about how Black and other marginalized communities often bear the brunt of environmental issues, like flooding and pollution.
“I was putting all this together: Newsrooms need diversifying. There's been a long term need for that. But now, looking at these (environmental) stories affecting mainly Black communities, and there are no people of color reporting on these stories, it was just, ‘I have to do something about that.’”
The Scripps school will hold its first science journalism class next semester.
With the World Wildlife Fund scholarship, Wilson said she hopes students can gain technical knowledge and terminology to understand and communicate complicated topics like climate science.
Jessica Leung, WWF’s director of diversity, equity and inclusion, said they rely on good communicators to relay messages about conservation. But they’ve seen the environmental journalism field “dwindling” due to challenges in the media industry.
“In order to see that we have a future where we have journalists that are still going to continue reporting on these issues, we thought it'd be really important to support a young scholar who wants to pursue journalism and also has an interest in the environment,” she said.
Alongside their regular spring coursework, the scholarship winner will train with WWF across different disciplines and work on projects like articles for the nonprofit’s magazine.
Leung said the scholarship will tailor to which environmental topics most interest the student, such as plastics pollution, marine life or deforestation.
She hopes the winning student will learn “how to zoom out and understand the sort of context in which these stories are living.”
Officials encourage rising sophomores through seniors at the school to apply here through Dec. 2. The winner will be announced on Jan. 29.
