Univision Arizona, ASU Cronkite School partner to air 'Cronkite Noticias'

Univision Arizona and the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication have partnered to regularly broadcast a 30-minute news program produced by bilingual Arizona State University students on important Latino community and statewide issues.

“Cronkite Noticias” airs on Univision Arizona’s KFPH UniMás every other Friday from 4 to 4:30 p.m. during the academic year. The first episode aired on Feb. 17. Students report on the economy, education, sustainability, immigration and other issues important to the region’s Latino communities.

“Creating opportunities for young bilingual journalists and media professionals to sharpen their craft and to tell stories that are critical to our Latino community is more important than ever today,” said Roberto Yañez, vice president and general manager of Univision Arizona and a member of the Cronkite Endowment Board of Trustees. “It is with great pride that we kick-off this new partnership with the Cronkite School that will allow us to give a platform to the next generation of leaders in the field.”

“Cronkite Noticias” is part of Cronkite Noticias/Mixed Voces, a new multiplatform Spanish-language news operation at the Cronkite School, which began last month. It is made possible by the Raza Development Fund, the largest Latino community development financial institution that is dedicated to generating economic growth and opportunities for Latino families across the country.

Currently, a team of bilingual Cronkite students are producing a variety of in-depth, Spanish-language digital and video stories for cronkitenoticias.org, which houses the “Cronkite Noticias” program after airing on UniMás Arizona.

“We are thrilled to be partnering with Univision Arizona on this important endeavor to expand critical news coverage to the Latino community,” said Christopher Callahan, dean of the Cronkite School. “We’re excited to share the outstanding work of our students, who regularly cover Latino issues under the guidance of our award-winning faculty.”

The “Cronkite Noticias” program is part of a growing constellation of classes and immersive professional experiences available to Cronkite students interested in Latino and borderlands issues.

Cronkite News, the student-staffed, professionally led news division of Arizona PBS, features a Borderlands Bureau in which students cover border and immigration issues in English under the guidance of award-winning borderlands journalists.

The Borderlands Bureau builds on a Latino seminar and a depth reporting class that takes students on a reporting trip to another country. Past projects have covered the Dominican Republic, Mexico, Nicaragua and Puerto Rico, among other regions.

The Cronkite School’s faculty includes three Southwest Borderlands Initiative professors, a faculty appointment plan designed to strengthen existing ASU scholarly and instructional resources on the Southwest and to enhance institutional recruitment and retention efforts toward building a faculty fully reflective of the Southwest borderlands’ diversity.

The Cronkite School is widely recognized as one of the nation’s premier professional journalism programs. Students participate in 13 professional immersion programs, guided by award-winning journalists and communications professional, applying what they have learned in the classroom in real-world learning environments.