Shortly after arriving at my new job at the University of Idaho in the summer of 2000, I met Mark Trahant, who had served for several years as a member of the UI School of Communication’s Advisory Board. I knew of Mark because of his national reputation as a journalist and as an activist for cultural diversity in America’s newsrooms.
In our very first conversation, we talked about things the UI School of Communication might be able to do to help journalism students learn how to cover tribal life and Indian affairs. In that conversation, Mark mentioned Lori Edmo-Suppah, editor of the Sho-Ban News in Fort Hall, as a potential visiting professor. Before long, Mark convinced The Freedom Forum to help fund a position for Lori for the 2001-02 school year. With that $45,000 grant, the UI Native American Journalism Project was born.
Over the last year, a group of senior journalism majors worked with Lori on a project on Idaho’s five Indian tribes. I worked with the group during the fall semester, and I was impressed with the students’ passion for the project. They learned quickly that the deadline-driven urgency of journalistic culture can clash with values in Native American culture. The students learned that they would need to work hard to cultivate sources, and that they shouldn’t expect phone calls to be returned from sources with whom they had not established a trusting relationship. Their patience and persistence were rewarded as they built those relationships and completed remarkable stories about Idaho’s Native Americans. They learned that good journalistic work is not easy, and that taking the time to understand complex issues is well worth the reward.
I learned along with my students that it takes a special effort for news organizations to effectively cover tribal issues. We also learned that there are important stories that need to be told and that the culture and history of Idaho’s Natives is rich and powerful. The students who worked on the project will leave the university with the skill to cover even the most complex stories out of Indian country, and that’s a skill that will make them invaluable to America’s newsrooms. They’ve also left behind a remarkable report that will be of value to all of Idaho’s citizens.