Finalists chosen in RJI Student Innovation Competition
Ten student teams from universities all over the country have been selected as finalists for the 2025 RJI Student Innovation Competition. The teams are developing open-source solutions that community news organizations can use to combat the growing issue of audiences avoiding the news.
A mix of undergraduate and graduate students representing universities in California, Georgia, Missouri, Mississippi and New York are competing for the grand prize of $10,000, with projects ranging from an AI-powered news app and a custom-curated news homepage to a “hopecore” podcast that focuses on positive news. The second and third-place teams will win $2,500 and $1,000, respectively.
Crucially, ideation is just the first step of the competition. The finalists must implement their projects and perform some sort of real-world testing to demonstrate their practical utility, often in partnership with a local news organization.
“This competition is about creativity and practicality coming together to find ways to bring people back into the news ecosystem,” said Kat Duncan, director of innovation at RJI. “These students have great ideas, and I’m excited to see them take shape in the real world.”
The finalists will present their projects to a panel of expert judges in April. Read on to learn more about the teams and judges.
Meet the judges
Kimberly Griffin, founding publisher and chief revenue officer of the Mississippi Free Press, boasts over two decades of experience in fundraising, marketing, sales and advertising. She’s part of Poynter Institute’s Media Transformation Challenge, aiming to expand the Free Press’s reach in the Mississippi Delta and Gulf Coast.
Ashlyn Lipori-Russie is the creator and host of Ask Ashlyn, an SMS and social media-based solution to news avoidance that invites users to ask questions about the news as if speaking with a journalist friend. Ashlyn’s diverse background spans investigative, broadcast, and digital journalism, as well as content management and strategic communication.
Alicia Ramirez is the founder and publisher of The Riverside Record, a nonprofit news outlet serving all of Riverside County, California. She has a master’s degree in journalism from West Virginia University and is an adjunct professor at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.
Meet the teams
Archana Pisupati and Leila Touati
Team Headline Hackers – California Polytechnic State University: A custom news quiz that reporters can use to amplify the reach of their stories. The team plans to partner with Mustang News, Cal Poly’s student newspaper.
Zachary Berston and Cameron Morrow
Team News AInchor – California Polytechnic State University: An AI-powered news aggregation app, complete with virtual anchors reading the news. This team will also work with Mustang News.
Alex Klavens and Justine Landis-Hanley
Team Here Today – Columbia University: A text-messaging service that sends audiences three top stories per day, along with a weather update. The team’s news partner will be Columbia News Service, the student newspaper for the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
Roman Broszkowski, Eleanor Hildebrandt and Riddhi Setty
Team Rarefiers – Columbia University: A plug-in allowing news organizations to grant users a more curated homepage featuring only five stories. The team plans to work with Iowa Capital Dispatch, which is part of the nationwide nonprofit news network States Newsroom.
Tierney Dickinson, Andy Fuselier, Olivia Goodwin and Cassidy Gordon
Team The Brightside – University of Mississippi: A podcast focused on positive news, based on the TikTok “hopecore” trend that emphasizes hope and human kindness. The team will seek to partner with a podcast platform, such as Spotify, to test their concept.
Candler Jewett, Anna Jones, Kennedy Judson and Alli Lefeaux
Team NewsFlash – University of Mississippi: AI-driven news videos catered toward a user’s preferences for subject matter and scale, incorporating local, national and global news. The team will introduce the service to students at the University of Mississippi to gather feedback and measure engagement.
Madelyn Bonkoski, Bethany Cates and Riley Gearhart
Team New News – University of Missouri: A newsletter that emulates the casual and accessible style of social media posts to make the reading experience more comfortable. The team hopes to work with a Missouri News Network outlet, such as NBC affiliate KOMU-TV, NPR-member station KBIA or the Columbia Missourian.
Yinan Wu and Xu Xu
Team Next Headline – University of Missouri: A method of interactive news consumption that allows residents to vote on what they want to see covered or submit suggestions. The team plans to work with two local news sources: the Columbia Missourian, the professional community newspaper for the Missouri News Network at the Missouri School of Journalism, and The Maneater, a student newspaper unaffiliated with the Missouri News Network.
Yuling Song, Yulei Xiao, Kaidi Shi and Shenshen Zhang
Team Flipop – University of Southern California: A news-reading widget that gamifies the experience of consuming the news, built around a self-developed framework known as Discover, Digest, Debrief. The team will work with Annenberg Media, the student news outlet for the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.
McKenna Edwards and Allison Mawn
Team UGA – University of Georgia: A widget users can connect to their favorite news websites, choosing parameters for alerts about stories they might be interested in. The team plans to work with either Grady Newsource, the student newspaper for the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at UGA, or with The Red & Black, another UGA student newspaper.
Cite this article
Fitzgerald, Austin (2024, Nov. 7). Finalists chosen in RJI Student Innovation Competition. Reynolds Journalism Institute. Retrieved from: https://rjionline.org/news/finalists-chosen-in-rji-student-innovation-competition/
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