Macleay College students Holly McGuinness, Jordan Marsden, Layton Holley and Claire Brownlie have travelled from both Sydney and Melbourne are the first to undertake the regional internships with locally-owned newspapers in western New South Wales.

The regional internships involve students writing articles for their respective newspapers, as well as having the opportunity to attend a variety of community events in order to gather stories.

The Cobar Weekly 

Journalism intern Holly McGuiness during her internship with the Cobar Weekly.

Holly, originally from Nowra but now living in Melbourne, says she has always been drawn to regional communities because of her own upbringing in a regional area.

The Cobar Weekly welcomed Holly for the internship, where she has been working with editor Sharon Harland for the last week. 

"It's been really interesting to find out how they run a small community newspaper, as there's only three women in the office," says Holly

"They have such a keen eye for making sure they're not putting things in the paper that aren't important to the locals."

Sharon Harland was interested in recruiting an intern for the paper after working single-handedly as the newspaper's journalist and photographer for over a year.

She says that recruiting Holly as an intern has been a valuable experience for the team, as having a newcomer share their perspective on the town "freshens up" the news.

"We'd be keen to continue with the internship program and hope that all of the students are as keen and interested as Holly has been." said Sharon Harland

Miss McGuinness hopes to finish her Diploma of Journalism after completing the internship, with aspirations to work in investigative journalism or foreign correspondence.

Holly says that working at The Cobar Weekly has opened her eyes to the possibility of working regionally after being immersed in the local culture and seeing how involved the community is with their town.

The Western Herald & Outback Radio 2WEB

In Bourke, Jordan Marsden and Layton Holley have undertaken their internship with both The Western Herald and Outback Radio 2WEB, which are both operated by the community-owned radio station. 

2WEB Chairman, Ian Cole, says that the radio station and The Western Herald got involved in the regional internships from having great experiences training interns previously.

Mr. Cole said that Layton Holley and Jordan Marsden dove straight into working and learning from the experienced team.

"As soon as they got here, they were writing stories. We put them straight to work on last week's edition and they both had stories put in last week's paper along with this week's edition."

Mr. Marsden is currently studying a Bachelor of Journalism at Macleay College's Sydney campus, whilst Layton Holley completed his degree this year.

Mr. Marsden says that it has been a great experience to work outside of the city and has opened his eyes to the opportunities that regional journalism has to offer.

"Working regionally, you get a smaller team. So, you get to do a lot more than you would in a city newsroom."

The Western Herald gave the interns the opportunity to visit the town Weilmoringle, which Jordan noted as a highlight.

"My favourite thing I've done is go to a regional school, which was two and a half hours away from Bourke. There were eight kids in the school and only 70 people who lived in the town," said Mr. Marsden

"It was great to go out there and see what it was like in a super rural area."

The Coonamble Times

Intern at the Coonamble Times, Claire Brownlie helped cover a story in Carinda - famous as a location in David Bowie's 'Let's Dance' video - during her first week.

Sydney Macleay College student, Claire Brownlie, joined the Coonamble Times last Tuesday for a two-week internship.

Miss Brownlie is currently studying a Bachelor of Journalism, and was drawn to working regionally after wanting to challenge her own experience of growing up in the city.

"I wanted to immerse myself in an area and way of life that I hadn't experienced. I think it's easy to read stories about rural areas from the city and be disconnected from the issues the media presents," said Miss Brownlie

"Coming to Coonamble and listening to the locals about the issues they are facing first-hand has been eye opening for me. I think it's important for anyone studying journalism to step outside their comfort zone to build knowledge beyond their own assumptions."

Coonamble Times Editor, Lee O'Connor, raised the idea of the internships after connecting with Macleay College's Journalism Program Lead Sue Stephenson and discussing the shortages of regional journalists.

Lee O'Connor says that there are many benefits of hosting city journalists for internships aside from having extra hands on deck.

"It's like having ambassadors from the city to the country and back, helping spread understanding of all the complex issues that are happening out here," she said.

"Wherever they go in their media careers, we would hope that they take something of the bush perspective with them."

"Hopefully, the internship program will turn into something really long term and something that might spread across all the Country Press papers in New South Wales."  

The regional internships will continue this week with two more Macleay students, Thomas Hanway and Jack Murray, having begun their internships at the Harden-Murrumburrah's Twin Town Times on Monday.