Engaging Gen Z in the Era of Algorithmic News Consumption

Lessons from a Knight-Wallace Fellow

Over time, I’ve become increasingly enthralled by how news reaches people. As the media landscape has changed, so have the ways people engage with news. Rather than fight a losing battle to keep news consumers where they were, I’ve followed their transition from print to digital, from static images to short-form videos. These shifts dictated my path from photographer to photo editor, to social media director at National Geographic, and, recently, to Knight-Wallace Fellow.

While working at TIME and National Geographic, I noticed a problem. We knew which content performed well on social media but didn’t fully understand what brought the content through the platforms’ algorithms and into users’ feeds. The issue wasn’t just who liked our content but who never got to see it. This disproportionately affected younger generations, who are the future of social media and the future of journalism.

They receive most of their news from social media platforms, which are served to them algorithmically by individual creators — not traditional news sources. Younger audiences no longer actively choose their news; instead, algorithms largely choose it for them.

What better place to try to tackle this issue than a campus full of Gen Z students? Early on, the Wallace House staff connected me with professors at the University of Michigan School of Information: Sarita Schoenebeck, Cliff Lampe and Paul Resnick. I started with general coursework but soon focused on marketing and leadership at the Ross School of Business. This helped me better understand the intersection between business and tech within the media landscape.

When I wasn’t taking business classes or attending Wallace House seminars, I collaborated with Professor Resnick to study students’ social media habits. Rather than asking students about their social media usage, we had them share news-related videos from their feeds. What I found surprised me — in ways both discouraging and hopeful.

Josh Raab with fellow students at the University of Michigan School of Information.

Time and again, I’d been told that young people don’t care about news, that social media is rife with misinformation, and that little can be done about it. While some of that is true, here are a few of the findings that changed my thinking:

  • Young people care about the news and are getting more of it than ever on social media platforms. Seventy-five percent of the news stories students saw were new to them.
  • While misinformation and bias exist, Michigan students had a good barometer for bullshit. Trustworthiness scores for news videos rated by students and journalists were within 10% similarity on average.
  • Individual creators have surpassed traditional media accounts. Fifty-four percent of the news videos weren’t from traditional sources — and students tended to trust creators more.
  • Seventeen percent of the news-related videos covered local news — making algorithmic social media a potential resource as traditional local news outlets face sharp declines.
  • The vast majority of news videos came from accounts that students did not follow. Students said they wanted more news on social media but were unsure who to follow for reliable content.

This all presents an interesting opportunity. Younger demographics are consuming more news than ever, and it’s increasingly coming from social news creators like Dylan Page, Jessica Burbank or Weather With Peyton. These creators are effective but often lack the journalistic support of traditional newsrooms.

The stimulation of my fellowship year and the quiet calm of Ann Arbor have been replaced by a new job at Google and the cacophony of New York City sirens. Still, the fellowship year and my findings continue to inform my thinking. I remain grateful for the experience — and just a little jealous of the current fellows floating around Ann Arbor, looking forward to their next seminar or planning a group outing to a football game or expedition to Detroit. In the future, I hope to launch a platform to connect news creators with journalists, provide fact-based news, combat misinformation and better reach social media consumers.

Josh Raab is a senior manager at Google, where he heads social strategy for Android, Google Chrome and Google Play.

This article appeared in the Fall 2024 issue of the Wallace House Journal.

Dieu-Nalio Chery, Photojournalist, Finds Renewed Purpose in Documenting the Haitian Diaspora


A Knight-Wallace Press Freedom Fellow in Action

When Donald Trump used the national debate stage to amplify false claims that Haitian immigrants were eating the pets of residents in Springfield, Ohio, Haitian photojournalist Dieu-Nalio Chery felt a mix of sadness and purpose.

“It’s painful for me to do a project on Haitians here [in the U.S.],” says Chery. “Haitians [in the U.S.] are suffering a lot. They are victims of racism. They are exploited. … Sometimes, when a community is underrepresented, the media will not spend money for a journalist to dig deeper. I feel that I can help with that.”

Chery grew up in the Haitian countryside and began working in his uncle’s photo studio in Port-au-Prince in his 20s. The powerful and heroic images that Chery captured throughout his ensuing two decades as a photojournalist — including 11 years working for The Associated Press — have become iconic records of 21st-century Haiti.

Much of Chery’s photography has focused on human rights issues — struggles of civilians living in slums, grassroots protest movements, government-perpetrated massacres of political opponents, the devastating aftermath of the 2010 earthquake and other natural disasters, the cholera epidemic, United Nations relief efforts and gang violence.

Chery’s most personally meaningful photography experience occurred in 2008, in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike. He accompanied a team of United Nations soldiers to save the lives of 35 children and teachers trapped in an orphanage surrounded by floodwaters. Despite not knowing how to swim, Chery waded in water up to his chin and carried children on his shoulders, one by one, to safety. He took moving photos throughout the successful rescue.

“We didn’t know if we would get out of that water,” Chery recalls. “It was crazy that day. I felt proud to be a part of that.”

Dieu-Nalio Chery standing infornt of a building displaying his photography
City of Asylum/Detroit projected Dieu-Nalio Chery’s photography onto the walls of its office building in Hamtramck, Michigan, as part of a September 2024 celebration of the Haitian community. Photo Credit: Joseph Sywenkyj

In 2019, while photographing the ratification ceremony of a newly appointed prime minister, Chery suffered an accidental gunshot wound to his jaw yet still managed to take an award-winning photograph that showed both the shooter — a Haitian senator — and the spent cartridges flying through the air.

In 2020, Chery was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in breaking news photography for a series of searing photos taken during protests across Haiti that called for the resignation of then-President Jovenel Moïse. Two years later, Chery was targeted for assassination by a powerful Haitian gang and narrowly escaped, fleeing Haiti. He and his family are now cobbling together a new life in the United States and seeking asylum. Chery has earned multiple prestigious fellowships while freelancing for major outlets, including The New York Times, Reuters and The Washington Post.

One of Chery’s ongoing goals is to write the articles that accompany his photography. In 2022, he wrote a feature story and created a photo essay for The Washington Post titled “Vodou in Photos: How Followers of an Ancient Faith Are Battling Stereotypes.” In 2023, he co-authored and photographed a piece for The New York Times about gentrification in Miami’s “Little Haiti” neighborhood.

Chery’s Knight-Wallace Fellowship project is aimed at capturing the Haitian diaspora’s diversity and resilience — highlighting how the community has “endured, grown, struggled and thrived
across generations.”

He will supplement his photography with crowd-sourced family photos, as well as images found in attics, basements, churches and university libraries.

Community engagement is central to Chery’s approach. He gave a powerful guest lecture at a recent University of Michigan symposium on Haiti. He also shared his Haitian diaspora photography at a public exhibition organized by City of Asylum/ Detroit. The event was held outdoors in a public space to ensure inclusivity and community spirit. Chery’s photography was projected onto the walls of City of Asylum’s future office building while guests enjoyed a spread of Haitian food.

Chery hopes that his next exhibition will be in Springfield, Ohio — the sudden epicenter of a vitriolic national immigration debate and the home of more than 12,000 Haitian immigrants. Chery would love to present his work to Springfield residents, as well as create a photo essay of portraits alongside quotes and text that illuminate residents’ diverse stories.

He says: “I want to make something [in Springfield] that can help unite the community.”

Some of Dieu-Nalio Chery’s photography can be viewed at visura.co/dieunalio.

This article appeared in the Fall 2024 issue of the Wallace House Journal.

Ashley Bates is the Associate Director of the Knight-Wallace Fellowships.

Zahra Nader, Afghan Journalist, Seeks Sustainability for Zan Times

A Knight-Wallace Press Freedom Fellow in Action

Zahra Nader vividly recalls the day her youngest sister was born in Kabul, Afghanistan. There was no running water in her family’s home, so Nader, then age 15, ran to get water to clean the baby — the sixth daughter in a family with only one son. She knew that the arrival of yet another girl in their male-dominated culture signaled more financial hardship for her parents. As she retrieved the water, she decided “I am going to become the boy that my family needs.”

Her loving and hardworking parents, neither of whom had the opportunity to learn to read and write, never imagined that their ambitious young daughter would become a talented writer, a New York Times reporter and a social justice-focused media entrepreneur.

Zahra Nader brainstorms with her classmates during her weekly Impact Studio workshop at the University of Michigan Ross School of Business. Photo Credit: Josh Jarmanning

Nader started publishing her poetry in high school and wrote articles for a local Afghan paper. At a private university in Kabul, she majored in law and continued to work in local journalism while studying English at a private center. She also attended a training program on how to work for international media outlets, after which she published her first English-language article in The Huffington Post about divorced women in Afghanistan.

She earned a meeting with The New York Times bureau chief in Kabul and ultimately landed a full-time job there. She reported primarily on women’s issues and gained access where male reporters could not — covering honor killings, “virginity test” facilities, households headed by single women and the social stigma of being a divorcee or a widow.

As the security situation deteriorated, Nader, her husband and her then-3-year-old son were forced to flee Afghanistan. They made a new home in Canada, where Nader struggled to chart a new path. A friend advised her that she now lives by: “You have finished one marathon in Afghanistan. You are starting another one in Canada. You always start from the beginning.” Buoyed by this encouragement, Nader applied for and was admitted to a master’s degree program and later a doctoral program in women’s studies at York University.

Shortly after that, the Taliban seized control of her homeland. Feeling compelled to act, Nader launched Zan Times, a non-profit Farsi and English online news site covering human and women’s rights in Afghanistan. (“Zan” means “woman” in Farsi.) She subsequently raised more than $30,000 through a fundraising campaign and earned some foundation grants. As the site’s editor-in-chief, Nader manages a team of mostly female journalists and editors, both in Afghanistan and in exile. She also leads the organization’s fundraising efforts and training programs for young reporters. All of her reporters are paid for their work.

As a 2025 Knight-Wallace Fellow, Nader is studying business models and management strategies that will create a roadmap for sustainability for Zan Times.

Zan Times highlights grassroots stories of suffering, courage and hope. One recent article, written by an anonymous reporter, chronicles strikes and protests organized by female public school teachers that partially succeeded in compelling the Taliban to reverse its decision to slash their salaries. Other articles cover ongoing brutality and executions by the Taliban, the struggles of Afghan female workers in Iran, novels and short stories written by Afghan authors and the life-threatening conditions faced by LGBTQ+ individuals in Afghanistan.

As a 2025 Knight-Wallace Fellow, Nader is studying business models and management strategies that will create a roadmap for sustainability for Zan Times. She was among 11 entrepreneurs selected for the esteemed Impact Studio program at the University of Michigan Ross School of Business. There, she participates in an intensive, two-semester incubator that helps innovators and entrepreneurs “bring impactful ideas to life.”

Nader is thrilled to have the opportunity for formal business coaching and loves the program’s interactive nature and the peer-to-peer learning it inspires. She is particularly eager to learn more about fundraising and marketing, with the goal of expanding the reach of the Zan Times weekly email newsletter and finding new institutional and individual donors.

After her Knight-Wallace Fellowship, Nader plans to continue leading Zan Times while concurrently finishing her Ph.D. and writing a dissertation focused on the stories of Afghan women’s rights activists from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. She will keep tackling new challenges and running new marathons. “It’s very important to me,” Nader says. “A lot of my relatives — especially the girls and my nieces — everybody’s looking up to me.”

The Zan Times English-language website can be viewed at zantimes.com.

Ashley Bates is associate director of Wallace House Center for Journalists.

This article appeared in the Fall 2024 issue of the Wallace House Journal.

The 37th Graham Hovey Lecture with Mazin Sidahmed of Documented

“Sorting Immigration Facts from Fiction: The Power of Local Reporting Amid National Politics”

September 10, 2024 | 5 p.m.
Reception following the lecture

Wallace House Gardens
620 Oxford Road, Ann Arbor

Welcome remarks by Valeria Bertacco,
Vice Provost for Engaged Learning, University of Michigan

Watch the video recording.

In a deeply polarizing election year, immigration remains one of the most contentious, sensationalized issues in American politics. Beyond the partisan rallying cries influencing the presidential race, immigration plays out in individual communities where needs, resources and actions often transcend party lines and knee-jerk responses. How journalists cover immigration – and who their coverage ultimately serves – can shape how Americans understand and debate this issue for generations.

Join Mazin Sidahmed, 2021 Knight-Wallace Reporting Fellow and co-founder of the non-profit newsroom Documented, for a discussion on how shifting our journalism focus from national coverage to local news outlets and from “reporting about” to “reporting for and with” immigrant communities can help us discern immigration fact from fiction and improve outcomes for everyone.

This is an in-person event and will not be live-streamed. However, a recording of the lecture will be available on our website following the event.

About the Speaker

Mazin Sidahmed is the co-founder and co-executive editor of Documented, an independent, non-profit newsroom dedicated to reporting with and for immigrant communities in New York City. He previously worked for the Guardian US in New York during the 2016 US elections, covering various issues, including surveillance and criminal justice, and the rise of hate crimes following the election. Sidahmed left the news desk to join the award-winning Guardian Mobile Innovation Lab, where he helped develop new mobile-specific story formats. He started his career writing for The Daily Star in Beirut, where he reported on the Syrian refugee crisis, weapons transfers to Lebanon and the plight of migrant domestic workers.

As a 2021 Knight-Wallace Reporting Fellow, Sidahmed reported for Documented on the role of local police in federal immigration enforcement.

About the Graham Hovey Lecture

The annual Graham Hovey Lecture recognizes a Knight-Wallace journalist whose career exemplifies the benefits of a fellowship at the University of Michigan and whose ensuing work is at the forefront of our national conversations. The event is named for the late Graham Hovey, director of the fellowship program from 1980 to 1986 and a distinguished journalist for The New York Times.

Michigan Public is a co-sponsor of this event.

The 36th Graham Hovey Lecture with ProPublica’s Anna Clark

“Government Secrecy from Flint to Oxford: Freedom of Information and the Public’s Right to Know”

September 12, 2023 | 5 p.m.
Reception following the lecture

Wallace House Gardens
620 Oxford Road, Ann Arbor

Welcome remarks by Tabbye Chavous,
Vice Provost for Equity and Inclusion and Chief Diversity Officer

Watch the video recording.

Michigan’s transparency laws are among the most restrictive in the nation. The state is one of only two that totally exempts the governor’s office and lawmakers from open records laws. With political polarization high and public trust in institutions low, a lack of transparency threatens to further weaken the social fabric. Pushing past the official version of events is essential to understanding abuses of power and exploring possible remedies.

For nearly two decades of reporting from and about Michigan, 2017 Knight-Wallace Fellow and ProPublica journalist Anna Clark has covered numerous consequential stories, from the Flint water crisis to the mass shooting at Oxford High School. Join her for a discussion on the dangers of a culture of secrecy for Michigan and beyond, and what it takes to push back.

This event will not be livestreamed. A recording of the lecture will be available on our website following the event.

About the Speaker

Anna Clark is a ProPublica journalist who lives in Detroit. She is the author of The Poisoned City: Flint’s Water and the American Urban Tragedy, which won the Hillman Prize for Book Journalism and the Rachel Carson Environment Book Award, and was longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction.

Clark’s writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Elle, The New Republic, Politico, Columbia Journalism Review, and other publications. She edited “A Detroit Anthology,” a 2015 Michigan Notable Book.

She is a nonfiction faculty member in Alma College’s MFA Program in Creative Writing. She was a Fulbright fellow in creative writing in Kenya. As a 2017 Knight-Wallace Fellow at the Univeristy of Michigan, Clark explored how chronic underfunding of American cities imperils residents.

About the Graham Hovey Lecture

The annual Graham Hovey Lecture recognizes a Knight-Wallace journalist whose career exemplifies the benefits of a fellowship at the University of Michigan and whose ensuing work is at the forefront of our national conversations. The event is named for the late Graham Hovey, director of the fellowship program from 1980 to 1986 and a distinguished journalist for The New York Times.

 

The 35th Graham Hovey Lecture with Scott Tong, host of NPR’s “Here & Now”

“China’s Paradox: Authoritarianism and Weakness”

September 15, 2022 | 5 p.m.
Reception following lecture

Wallace House Gardens
620 Oxford Road, Ann Arbor

Welcome remarks by Tabbye Chavous,
Vice Provost for Equity and Inclusion and Chief Diversity Officer

This event is in-person.

Watch the video recording.

Wallace House announces the return of our outdoor, in-person Graham Hovey Lecture

In 2013, longtime China correspondent Scott Tong came to the Knight-Wallace Fellowships to research China’s on-again, off-again ties with the global community and how it connected with his own family. The resulting book, “A Village with My Name: A Family History of China’s Opening to the World,” examines nationalism and globalization through the stories of five generations of Tongs. China’s openness to the western world delivered great benefits to the country yet came at a devasting human price during Mao’s communist rule. In the end, this openness made it possible for Tong to become an American journalist covering China.

Today, Beijing’s increasingly antagonistic relations with Washington and many advanced economies present a great risk to its own economy and high-tech development.

Now a co-host of NPR’s Here & Now Tong returns to Wallace House to deliver the 35th Graham Hovey Lecture and discuss Beijing’s increasing authoritarianism and international aggression and what it signals for its own future and that of globalization.

About the Speaker

Scott Tong is an author and the co-host of Here & Now, NPR’s midday news magazine, produced at WBUR. Previously he spent 16 years at Marketplace as Shanghai bureau chief and senior correspondent. As a 2014 Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan, Tong explored comparative ecosystems, innovation and the history of China.

About the Graham Hovey Lecture

The annual Graham Hovey Lecture recognizes a Knight-Wallace journalist whose career exemplifies the benefits of a fellowship at the University of Michigan and whose ensuing work is at the forefront of our national conversations. The event is named for the late Graham Hovey, director of the fellowship program from 1980 to 1986 and a distinguished journalist for The New York Times.

 

This event is outdoors. Wallace House will follow the University of Michigan’s Covid protocol and guidelines for this in-person event.

Michigan Radio
Michigan Radio

Michigan Radio is a co-sponsor of this event.

Wallace House Welcomes Afghan Journalist and His Family Back to Ann Arbor

Jawad Sukhanyar, an Afghan journalist and Knight-Wallace alum, returned to Ann Arbor.

Jawad Sukhanyar, an Afghan journalist and 2019 Knight-Wallace Fellow, returned to Wallace House and the University of Michigan on October 4, 2021, after fleeing the Taliban in Afghanistan with his family in August.

Sukhanyar will join the university as a journalist-in-residence with the Donia Human Rights Center and the International Institute. The research fellowship, sponsored by Wallace House, will commence once Sukhanyar receives full clearance from U.S. resettlement and immigration officials.

“Among the tens of thousands of Afghans now beginning the difficult process of resettling in communities across the U.S., many are journalists and support workers who faced persecution and death in their home country for being employed by American news organizations,” said Lynette Clemetson, Director of Wallace House. “It is imperative that we come together to support these journalists, and it is a privilege to be able to provide a safe and welcoming community for this family at such a critical moment.”

Sukhanyar was a reporter for The New York Times in Afghanistan from 2011 to 2019. At the time, he was the longest-serving reporter in the organization’s Kabul bureau. He came to the university in September 2018 as a Knight-Wallace Fellow, where he studied issues related to women’s rights in Afghanistan. A target of the Taliban for his reporting and his affiliation with a U.S. media outlet, Sukhanyar, and his family faced grave danger from the extremist group.

“Being in Ann Arbor brings a sigh of relief for all of us. We have so many good memories of living here. But this time it is a bittersweet experience. None of us wanted to leave Afghanistan. We built our home there. We were forced to leave, and there is no hope that we can return,” said Sukhanyar. “When we were in Ann Arbor before, I was here learning so I could take it all back to my country. Now we are here to survive.”

In July, Wallace House invited Sukhanyar to return to the university as a journalist-in-residence. Unable to secure a visa to leave Afghanistan before the collapse of its capital to the Taliban, Sukhanyar and his family escaped chaos and gunfire at the Kabul airport and hid in the city for several days before being successfully evacuated out of their home country to safety.

The evacuation, led by The New York Times, was part of an extraordinary effort to save the lives of the Afghan staff who aided their journalism over the past 20 years. In an arduous journey reported by The Times, the group of more than 100 Afghans transited through Qatar and Mexico before entering the U.S. in Houston at the end of August.

“I feel safe now. I was five years old when I lost my father in the early days of the Afghan civil war,” remembers Sukhanyar. “What I went through as a child, what I have seen in my country, I don’t want my children to experience that.”

Once immigration officials approve him to begin his fellowship at the university, Sukhanyar will study the implications of the U.S. departure from Afghanistan and new rule under the Taliban. Through his affiliation with the Donia Human Rights Center, he will engage with faculty, students, and community members interested in learning about his role as a journalist covering U.S. and Taliban influence in his home country.

“The Donia Center is honored and delighted to welcome Jawad as a journalist-in-residence. His expertise on human rights in Afghanistan, gained from years of on-the-ground reporting, will prove an extraordinary asset to students and faculty interested in human rights work,” said Steven Ratner, U-M Profesor of Law and Director of the Donia Human Rights Center.  “We look forward to connecting Jawad with people throughout the university who will be eager to hear from him.”  

After several agonizing months, the return to Ann Arbor is a homecoming of sorts for the Sukhanyar, his wife, and their four children. Now they look forward to starting school and settling into a stable routine with new friends. 

Jason Beaubien “Planes and Pestilence: Emerging Epidemics in a Globalized World”

Jason Beaubien event page30th Graham Hovey Lecture with Jason Beaubien, Knight-Wallace Fellow ’07

The annual Graham Hovey Lecture honors a Knight-Wallace journalist whose career exemplifies the benefits of a fellowship at the University of Michigan and whose ensuing work is at the forefront of national conversation.

“Planes and Pestilence: Emerging Epidemics in a Globalized World”
September 10, 2015
Wallace House

View video »

 
 

Watch the Lecture

Jason Beaubien, global health and development correspondent for NPR and Knight-Wallace alum, returned to Wallace House in September 2015 to deliver the 30th Graham Hovey Lecture. Drawing from his reporting on HIV/AIDS, MERS, SARS and the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, Beaubien examined the rapid spread of disease in a globalized economy, anticipated the coming of an ambitious virus that “transmits easily, bides its time and its host before making that host sick, and manages to spread all over the world,” then asked if the world was ready for the next pandemic.

From our archives is his talk “Planes and Pestilence: Emerging Epidemics in a Globalized World.”

 

About the Speaker

Jason Beaubien is the global health and development correspondent for NPR, where he was part of a team of reporters that won a Peabody Award in 2015 for their extensive coverage of the West Africa Ebola outbreak. He reports on a range of health issues across the globe. He’s covered the plight of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, mass cataract surgeries in Ethiopia, abortion in El Salvador, poisonous gold mines in Nigeria, drug-resistant malaria in Myanmar and tuberculosis in Tajikistan.

Prior to becoming NPR’s global health and development correspondent in 2012, Beaubien spent four years based in Mexico City covering Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. He served as a foreign correspondent in Sub-Saharan Africa from 2002 to 2006 visiting 27 countries on the continent. Beaubien was one of the first journalists to report on the mass exodus of people out of Sudan’s Darfur region into Chad.

Beaubien earned a B.A. in English from San Francisco State University. As a Knight-Wallace Fellow at Michigan (2006-2007), he studied the intersection of the First and Third World.
 

About the Graham Hovey Lecture

The annual Graham Hovey Lecture recognizes a Knight-Wallace journalist whose career exemplifies the benefits of a fellowship at the University of Michigan and whose ensuing work is at the forefront of national conversation. The event is named for the late Graham Hovey, director of the fellowship program from 1980 to 1986 and a distinguished journalist for The New York Times.