E-mail this pageJournalism Program at SUNY Plattsburgh
Do you want to make a difference? Do you want to inform and entertain readers about the world?
If so, then journalism at Plattsburgh State may be the major for you.
Our journalism program is different.
We teach theory and skills, but we balance them with an emphasis on practical experience. To get the story, our students have interviewed presidential hopefuls in the New Hampshire primary, traveled to Quebec to listen to wolves, studied moose in Vermont, and attended national press conferences.
All of our students work for Plattsburgh State's two publications: Cardinal Points, our campus newspaper, which has twice been selected as New York's best all-around college newspaper, and All Points North, our online magazine that covers the culture, people, and places of the Adirondack and Lake Champlain regions.
You can
- Study in state-of-the-art computer classrooms
- Gain practical experience at our award-winning college newspaper Cardinal Points and at our regional online magazine All Points North.
- Learn from distinguished visiting journalists.
- Get personal attention from faculty with real-world experience in our small-size classes.
- Gain valuable internship experience.
- Develop a portfolio of clips to show prospective employers.
- Benefit from our high placement rate: more than 88 percent of our students find work in journalism within four months of graduation.
Our graduates have gone on to successful careers at media outlets such as People, Harper's Bazaar, MTV, Dateline NBC, The Wall Street Journal, and Hearst Entertainment.
Flexible study options
- Our students can major in newspaper or magazine journalism.
- If you like the outdoors, you will love our courses in Science and Environmental Writing and Outdoor Writing.
- If you are interested in digital journalism, you can produce Web sites and publications for the community.
Faculty with real-world experience
To write stories, our teachers have traveled to the North Slope of Alaska to examine global warming, to New Hampshire to cover the presidential primary, to Hawaii to investigate noise pollution, and to Midway Atoll for a travel article. Their articles have appeared in national newspapers and magazines, such as SKI, Popular Science, Discover, College Media Review, and Audubon. They have also served as editors, photographers, writing coaches, journalism award judges, and editorial consultants.
Program News
All Points North Set to Take Stands in Print
All Points North (www.apnmag.com) the online journal published quarterly by SUNY Plattsburgh students is making the leap from the digital to the print world with a new issue which is scheduled to come out this May.
All Points North has been published online since December 2001. It covers the people, destinations, and culture of the North Country - broadly defined from Quebec, Canada, to Albany, N.Y., to Burlington, Vt. Promising its readers a fresh package, the new print version of All Points North shall be an expansion of its online sister.
Published once a year and funded by the school, All Points North print will give students hands-on experience, designing and producing a print magazine.
Magazine journalism major Jen Taft is editor-in-chief of the 40-page magazine. "I have learned so much from working on this magazine," Taft says. "I feel much more confident and prepared for jobs in this field."
The staff plans to publish more frequently, and at the same time, offer readers more vibrant material about the North Country region. Eventually, All Points North print hopes to sustain itself through support from advertisers.
To request a free copy of the premiere print issue of All Points North, please contact Gretel Schueller.
Cardinal Points Wins Award
Cardinal Points, the student newspaper at the State University of New York College at Plattsburgh, was named by the Associated Collegiate Press (ACP) to be a 2007 ACP Newspaper Pacemaker Finalist, which places it in a prestigious list of the top 40 college newspapers in North America. Read more about the awards. Read Cardinal Points online.
Media Ethics Workshop
Each year the Department of Journalism hosts a Media Ethics Workshop that brings together faculty, professional journalists, and student journalists.
Annual Writers Conference
Each spring the Department of Journalism hosts a writers conference featuring celebrated authors and journalists. Past speakers include award-winning environmetal author Bill McKibben and Pulizter-Prize winner Ron Powell. Contact Gretel Schueller for more information.
Dean H. Waldenberger Jr. Scholarship
Each spring, the Dean H. Waldenberger Jr. Scholarship, about $1,000, is awarded, and is usually split between two students, one majoring in newspaper journalism, the other in magazine journalism. The scholarship is granted to journalism majors who make the greatest journalism contributions and succeed to the best of their ability during the academic year. All journalism students are considered for this scholarship; an application is not needed.
Learn More
Questions, Comments, Suggestions?
If you would like to learn more about the Journalism Department at Plattsburgh State, please contact
Shawn Murphy
Chair, Department of Journalism
Co-Director, Center for Communication and Journalism
Office: Yokum Hall 103-A
Phone: 518-564-2422
Fax: 518-564-2105
E-mail: shawn.murphy@plattsburgh.edu