Newsroom 2013 takes off!

Aspiring young journalists from six countries and across the United States — 78 in all — filed into Casa Adelfa at Stanford yesterday morning to receive press passes and reporters’ notebooks.

During orientation, program co-director Beatrice Motamedi introduced a quotation by John Freeman, editor of the British literary magazine Granta: “It happens that the big storytellers of this generation are people with a very complicated sense of home.”

Our backgrounds reflect that diversity of home, and we think the students’ passions will fuel a week of non-stop storytelling through articles, photo essays, and videos.

Team leaders Scott, Kelsey, and Angela prepare to meet incoming students. Their Newsroom journey began Saturday when they met to discuss plans for the week. Kelsey said, “I’m impressed to see their enthusiasm and bravery.”

Year 1 classmates will work in teams to generate content for themed websites, with topics including the arts, immigration, and food sustainability. Meanwhile, Year 2 members will each create individual websites that will focus on their interests.

Our busy week will be filled with classes to help students use multimedia in their journalism work, field trips to San Francisco and into Silicon Valley, journalistic movies, and unconventional guest speakers. Sunday night, in preparation for a Skype session on Tuesday with director Ann Shin, students watched

New friends play a game of cards in the hallway of Casa Adelfa. After a long day of orientation and brainstorming themes with their team leaders, students enjoy relaxing together. The fun is just beginning!

The Defector, a documentary about the dangerous process of escaping North Korea.  On Monday, Newsroom will be honored to host Adam Johnson, who won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2013 for The Orphan Master’s Son, a book about life and oppression in North Korea. Martyn Williams, a PCWorld columnist whose blog, North Korea Tech, follows tech developments in North Korea, will moderate the evening. The rest of the week will bring more stories, articles, and experiences. Check back for more posts by us about life as a student journalist at Newsroom by the Bay.