Dive Brief:
- Enrollment in journalism degree programs across the country is on the rise after falling from peaks earlier in the decade, The Washington Post reported.
- The trend is credited to several factors, including the availability of new technology and storytelling platforms, the ability to tell stories of historically overlooked and disadvantaged groups, and the desire to emulate models of investigative reporting coming out of the #MeToo movement and the Trump presidency.
- The field has shrunk in recent years as traditional newsrooms struggle to compete with the growing number of free information sources online, and many journalism schools have similarly suffered. Some administrators are comparing the current surge in interest to "a Watergate moment."
Dive Insight:
The job market for journalism students has improved somewhat since the Great Recession as traditional newsrooms adapt to new storytelling technology and digital-only ventures disrupt the space further. Regardless of platform, however, students are drawn to the field for the opportunity "to tell their own stories" and "provide truthful information to improve their communities," Gail Wiggins, interim journalism chair at North Carolina A&T University told The Atlantic in August.
Trump's outspoken animosity toward the press, the publication notes, has created a "whiplash news cycle" driving a generation of young people to journalism in response, similar to the events of the 1960s and 1970s.
MarketWatch reported earlier this year that applications to Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism were up 10% during the 2017-18 academic year after five years of consistent figures. At the University of Southern California, first-year applications to the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism peaked this year after rising 19% over the course of the past three to four years. And Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications saw a 24% increase in applications for the 2018-19 year, MarketWatch noted.
An uptick in subscriptions to leading news publications such as The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal stems from similar drivers as those bringing more students into journalism programs, according to The Observer. Yet the federal government reported that by 2026, the number of journalism jobs will drop by 9% and salaries will stay relatively low.