Scholarship recipients Asia Palomba and Samuel Cronin

The New England Professional Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists is pleased to announce Northeastern students Asia London Palomba and Sam Cronin as the 2018 first and second place recipients of the NE SPJ chapter scholarship respectively.

Palomba, who is entering her junior year, said she dreams of one day working as a foreign correspondent.  Her young career is off to a great start. This past May Palomba completed a five-month internship with the Christian Science Monitor, where she reported on issues including homelessness, providing hygiene products for incarcerated women, and turning air pollution into ink. In May 2017, Palomba spent six weeks reporting from Athens and Thessaloniki with Northeastern, and her story on how the economic crisis has prevented certain cities in Greece from preserving and excavating their ancient monuments was picked up by WCVB Channel 5 in Boston.

“Often we allow ourselves to be distant from problems which don’t affect our lives, holding the people who struggle through them at arm’s length. However, I believe that journalism has the capability to act as an antidote to desensitization, bringing these stories and these people to life,” Palomba said in her application essay. “I want to cover stories which deal with people making a difference, which shed a light on issues which may not seem important or relevant, but are indeed very significant to members of the community in question.”

Cronin, who is entering his sophomore year, will spend the fall semester serving as lifestyle editor for Northeastern’s independent student newspaper, The Huntington News. He said he’s previously written for the paper, covering concerts, politics and panels, and that he’s “loved every minute of it.” He said he’s “aware of the great responsibility” of his new role, and is looking forward to it. “Exposing interesting stories to a wider audience with quality reporting should be a unique challenge and I look forward to being both in the newsroom and the field,” Cronin said in his application essay.

The New England PRO Chapter of SPJ is proud to help these two aspiring journalists take the next steps in their young careers, and looks forward to watching them develop among the next generation of great reporters.