Student journalists’ work continues as they play important role in connecting the Liberty community

Staff at Liberty University’s student newspaper, the Liberty Champion, know this is not a time to sit idle, despite a global pandemic. There is still news to tell, and now, more than ever, they feel a sense to connect the student body and keep them informed.

With Liberty students finishing the semester remotely due to residential courses moving online in compliance with COVID-19 restrictions in Virginia, the Champion won’t be available in print, but the staff — mostly journalism students in the School of Communication and the Arts (SCA) — will continue to post content at Liberty.edu/Champion and on the paper’s Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts.

“I was heartbroken that my days of seeing the newspaper on the racks each week had ended for the semester, but I understood why the decision was made,” said Emily Wood, a senior journalism student and the Champion’s editor-in-chief. “I am just thankful that we will continue to provide online content each week. Journalism is essential in a time like this, and distribution of the news must go on.”

This week’s content included stories on administration’s efforts to combat COVID-19 and a feature on how a Liberty Fulbright finalist is incorporating science into the fashion industry. Another article includes Q&As from each of Liberty’s student-body election candidates, and the sports section even published a team profile about Liberty’s DI hockey team, whose season abruptly ended because of the virus. Despite working off-campus, the Champion staff’s vision remains grounded: to provide Liberty students, faculty, and alumni opportunities to stay informed during this global crisis.

“The students have taken the challenge of producing this electronic version of the paper with great energy and a full heart,” said Liberty Champion Executive Director Deborah Huff, who has taught journalism at Liberty for 25 years. “They have seized the opportunities to be involved with online publishing and continue on with the news reporting that they love. … The students could’ve said, ‘Oh, we can’t do this. We don’t want to do this,’ but they didn’t.”

“Drastic times call for drastic measures,” Wood said. “This is an unprecedented time. … Being able to continue to provide full content online allows us to continue doing what we love and finish our year strong, even if it’s from home.”

During a typical semester, the Champion has multiple moving parts. Twenty-plus undergraduate writers, student-editors, photographers, designers, and social media managers operate the weekly publication, which circulates nearly 300,000 print issues annually, making it the largest weekly circulating newspaper in Central Virginia.

Beyond course credit, the Champion gives student journalists a glimpse into newsroom culture, while also providing an avenue for writers to obtain published bylines. In addition to the weekly circulation, the Champion collected over half a million website page views in 2019, and is on track to significantly surpass that number in 2020.

During a normal production week, the staff meets to discuss story ideas each Wednesday. Staffers work between 15-30 hours per week, sometimes over the weekend, to meet the Monday night deadline. The paper is released on campus and mailed on Tuesdays.

While current circumstances have certainly altered the production process and the type of content, students are being creative in discovering stories that still engage and inform readers.

“The sports section is taking a little bit of a different direction now that we don’t have any actual events to cover,” said senior journalism student Emily Baker, who has worked as the

Champion’s sports editor for two years. “We’re focusing more on athlete profiles and their stories and what they’re up to now, rather than their game performances and season updates. We’ve got fall updates coming out, and we’re talking to teams about how they’re training and getting ready for their fall schedules.”

“Production has been very different, but our team has adapted well,” Wood said. “Producing content remotely and completely online requires us to stay in constant communication with one another. It has been encouraging to see how everyone across the board has adjusted to the pandemic, while still providing quality work.”

For more information about opportunities for student communicators to obtain practical experience while in college, visit the SCA webpage.