Academics

Students will travel to Cuba to cover baseball and give a glimpse of life

Future trip to Brazil planned to cover the 2016 Paralympic Games

Credit: Penn StateCreative Commons

Undergraduate students studying sports journalism at Penn State will make two separate international trips in the coming months, covering sports and more in Cuba and Brazil.

The trips -- following the Penn State baseball team during a one-of-a-kind trip to Cuba in November and covering the Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro in September 2016 -- display a commitment by the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism, housed in the College of Communications, to complement its core courses and consistent on-campus programming with special working opportunities for students.

“The Curley Center is giving its students real-time, professional experiences while covering events of cultural significance,” said John Affleck, the Knight Chair in Sports Journalism and Society and director of the Curley Center. “The trip to Havana could not come at a more important moment for U.S.-Cuba relations and we are excited that we’ll be there to tell the story for everyone back in Pennsylvania.”

In the past, Penn State students have covered the Croke Park Classic, Super Bowl, Final Four and Olympics as part of similar endeavors.

Eight students will travel to Cuba in November, following the Penn State baseball team and providing content for media outlets across the state as part of a partnership with the Pennsylvania News Media Association. The Curley Center utilized a similar approach following the Penn State football team to Ireland for the Croke Park Classic in 2014. More than 20 media organizations used the content that students produced.

While the model will be similar, Affleck knows that the Cuba trip poses a different set of challenges. “Americans did not see much of Cuba in the 50-plus years our nations had no formal diplomatic relations,” he said. “Sports is a great window on culture and we hope to give readers and viewers a better sense of what Cuba and Cubans are like through that lens of sports.”

Students have been preparing for the trip to Cuba for weeks without knowing until recently whether the trip would get approval from the Cuban government. It is the second trip featuring students from the College of Communications in the past three years to Cuba. A separate group in an international reporting class traveled to Havana in 2014.

A second international trip for the Curley Center will take place nearly a year from now, in September 2016, when a group of students travels to Brazil to cover the Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.

That class will be a partnership between the Curley Center and The Associated Press. Again, students will gain valuable, real-world experience while covering a major event. Like other such trips, the mix of cultural and professional challenges exemplifies the goal of the Curley Center in preparing student sports journalists through unrivaled and thought-provoking opportunities.

“We want students to get experiences here that are not possible anywhere else,” said Affleck, who started planning a trip to the Paralympic Games nearly a year ago. “And we are lucky enough to have quality students who can undertake such endeavors, grow personally and, at the same time, help news organizations by providing meaningful content.”

During all the trips, Curley Center students focus on storytelling through broadcast, multimedia and print journalism options.

An application process for Curley Center students interested in the trip to Rio for the Paralympic Games will be conducted at the start of the spring semester.

John Affleck (right), director of the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism, and eight students will travel to Cuba in November.  Credit: John Beale / Penn StateCreative Commons

Last Updated June 2, 2021