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Every week, Syracuse University professor Aileen Gallagher helps Longreads highlight the best of college journalism. Here’s this week’s pick:

Good journalism costs money. It also takes a little nerve. Sonali Kohli and Blaine Ohigashi of UCLA’s Daily Bruin have both resources. The Bridget O’Brien Scholarship Foundation annually funds an ambitious reporting project proposed by UCLA student journalists. Kohli and Ohigashi went to Malawi, where UCLA has a strong research presence, to report on the LGBT community in a country that outlaws homosexuality. The students were urged by university officials not to make the trip, but they did. The sources who spoke to the reporters did so at considerable risk to themselves and their loved ones.

Kohli and Ohigashi returned and created an ambitious multimedia package. International stories produced by student journalists tend to have a quick, parachute sensibility with little context. The Bridget O’Brien Scholarship Foundation gave Kohli and Ohigashi the time and resources they needed to do right by their story.

In the Shadows

Sonali Kohli, Blaine Ohigashi | Daily Bruin | October 2013

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Professors and students: Share your favorite stories by tagging them with #college #longreads on Twitter, or email links to aileen@longreads.com.


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