Welcome to the Illinois Public Media student newsroom!

At the Illinois Student Newsroom, journalism students from the U of I's College of Media work alongside professional journalists -- public radio reporters, editors and producers -- to produce multimedia stories on issues affecting east-central Illinois.

Stories get edited by an Illinois Student Newsroom producer and an IPM editor before they go on air or publish online. But everything you'll find on this page is produced 100% by students. They determine the content, and they're responsible for the final product.

Before the program began in 2020, only a half-dozen student stories a year were deemed professional enough for broadcast. Since we came into being, IPM has broadcast more than 500 student stories. Several have garnered state and national awards, including four Hearst Audio Awards medallions.

Our model is a hybrid program drawing from the best of classroom, internship, professional and student-media practices, with a student newsroom embedded within the pre-existing professional IPM newsroom.

Our students attend staff meetings and become news leaders both in the IPM newsroom and in other professional newsrooms well before graduation. The value of this real-world experience is evident in students’ progress as they engage in high-wire acts of newsgathering and production in a way few college students do.

This model represents our approach to journalism education: real-world, leadership-centered student independence supported by coaching from professional journalists.

We like it think the whole thing is summed up in our tagline: "Student staff. Public radio newsroom. Professional journalism."

Please take a moment to click around the page and let us know what you think. You can always reach us at illinoisstudentnewsroom@gmail.com and follow us on Instagram at @illinoisstudentnewsroom.