STORIES

F.D. Reese Insists on Using the Front Door
“There were those who made sure they made you feel like you were less,” said Reverend Dr. F.D. Reese about the treatment of black…

Freedom Academy Offers an Integrated Alternative to Public Schools
Shania Black, 12, was the first black student to attend all-white Morgan Academy, a school founded on the heels of integration in the ’60s…

Selma’s Troubled Schools Get a New Superintendent
After years of struggling, the Selma City School district is hoping to start a new chapter by appointing Angela Mangum as the district’s new Superintendent.

The Millers Run a Funeral Parlor and Bridge Communities
Randall and Betty Miller defied local custom and married in Selma, Ala. during a time, 25 years ago, when racial tension was still high.

Grow Selma Hopes to End Food Desert
For $10 local residents dined on southern delicacies like pulled pork sandwiches, ribs and chicken. The more adventurous tasted alligator bites and rattlesnake eggs…

Protest on the Bridge
Each year in April, a month after celebrating the voting rights victories achieved in Selma, the town hosts the Battle of Selma Re-enactment festivities.

Bridging Selma presents an extraordinary opportunity for a troupe of journalism students and faculty from Morgan State University and West Virginia University to engage in an experiment in social justice reporting.

Ground Zero – Selma, Alabama – is our classroom. Our method is to look at Selma today through the prism of the past. Bridging is our metaphor — Bridging historical divides of race by reporting on the real outcomes of the hope and promise of political, economic and educational opportunity of 50 years ago. Bridging cultures – how students and faculty from a historically black college and those from a rural, predominantly white school can explore the difficult issues surrounding both their diversity and commonality.

Our goal is to empower young journalists to collaboratively confront issues of race and representation, and to instill in them a critical agency over that narrative. Our objectives are to sensitively explore and advance an essential dialogue on race and justice, and to create an immersive environment where students can learn from each other as they accelerate their journalistic and reporting skills using emerging technologies.

About Morgan State University

Morgan State University is a historically black university with 7300 students in the heart of Baltimore, Md. At Morgan, the newly founded School of Global Journalism and Communication has launched an initiative to get students out of the classroom and into the community to do shoe-leather reporting on the social justice issues of the day, in particular issues affecting the black community. The school is committed to giving students practical, hands-on experience by providing meaningful, faculty-guided projects that encourage them to experiment and practice the multimedia skills they are learning in the classroom. Thus armed, they can make a difference in the world.

About West Virginia University

The West Virginia University Reed College of Media is a student-centered school that has been graduating journalists and strategic communicators since 1939. The College offers innovative curriculum and real-world experiences that prepare students for 21^st century media. In all programs students learn by doing, producing stories and hands-on projects that use the latest digital media technology. Our program also has a deep history of social action projects, and we are recognized for exhibiting a willingness to experiment while holding true to our core pursuit of media that matters.

Workroom

Learning Lab

This project is a collaboration between Morgan State University’s School of Global Journalism and Communication and West Virginia University’s Reed College of Media.
Bridging Selma is the first in a series of social justice reporting projects called StoryBridge. This joint initiative is an experiment in creating a new kind of classroom that explores the uses of emerging technology in crossing divides of race, class and gender in journalism and documentary practice.