Fourteen UofM Journalism Students Will Cover Rio Olympics

April 28, 2016 - Fourteen journalism students from the University of Memphis will travel to Rio de Janeiro this summer to cover the Olympic Games. The UofM is one of only two universities (along with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) to have an agreement with Rio's Olympic Organizing Committee to bring students there as interns.

Dr. Roxane Coche, assistant professor in the UofM's Department of Journalism and Strategic Media, will be supervising the program from July 29 to Aug. 22. The students will begin work Aug. 1 and will receive three hours of academic credit. The 2016 Summer Olympics open Aug. 5.

The group will be housed in an Olympic Media Village, where they will be surrounded by international media professionals, giving the students a unique opportunity to network.

The student reporters will be assigned a sport, which they will cover during the entirety of the games for the Olympic News Service (ONS), which acts as a newswire service for the Games. All quotes and reports will be published on an Internet-based service, only accessible to accredited media, officials and National Olympic Committees. International media will then use ONS work to produce their own stories.

"Few people in their lifetime get to say 'I went to the Olympics,' let alone 'I covered the Olympics,'" said Coche. "This is an incredible opportunity for our students, and it puts the University of Memphis on the map of sports journalism education. It is an exciting time for all of us in the Department of Journalism and Strategic Media."

FOR MORE INFORMATION
Dr. Roxane Coche
901.678.2854
rcoche@memphis.edu