Pushkin Industries and The Bell announce new podcast incubator for college students
March 1, 2023
NEW YORK, NY — Today, Pushkin Industries, the award-winning audio company co-founded by Malcolm Gladwell and Jacob Weisberg, and The Bell, a leading youth journalism nonprofit, announce a new partnership aimed at diversifying the pipeline of podcast creators.
Podcast U, a nine-week training program for motivated college-age students with dreams of hosting their own podcast, will debut this spring with five students who graduated from New York City public high schools within the last two years.
“I’m excited by the unpredictability of working with my peers on an audio project,” said Carmen Lopez Villamil, sophomore at Yale University. “I want to learn how to assemble stories that make listeners feel things.”
Podcast U lead coordinator Mia Lobel photo by Tatiana Flowers
Weekly virtual workshops will run from March 3 to April 28. Students will each work to complete a pilot episode for a new show that they hope to launch.
Pushkin’s former head of content, Mia Lobel, will serve as the program’s lead coordinator, and several Pushkin employees across various departmental functions will teach workshops or serve as one-on-one mentors throughout the program.
“There is nothing more inspiring than working with a talented group of students who bring fresh ideas and perspectives to podcasting,” Lobel said. “This is exactly what the industry needs to survive and thrive!”
Podcast U represents an exciting addition to The Bell’s programmatic offerings. Its summer and school-year internships have provided rigorous audio journalism training to more than 100 public high school students since 2018.
“So many of our program alumni graduate high school wanting to keep pursuing podcasting, but quality training programs can be cost prohibitive,” said Taylor McGraw, The Bell’s executive director. “We’re thrilled now to offer another rung on the ladder toward professional podcasting for young people whose voices the world needs to hear.”
In addition to professional instruction and mentorship, participating students will receive complimentary access to Hindenburg Journalist Pro editing software and a personal stipend.
“By producing a podcast, receiving quality mentorship, and collaborating with fellow peers, I hope to put my journalistic skills into practice and acquire new ones that would make me stand out in the workforce,” said Malak Kassem, freshman at Pace University.
Read about the inaugural student class below.
STUDENT BIOS
Renika Jack is a freshman at York College. Originally from Guyana, Renika moved to New York City in 2019. She has worked with The Bell’s Miseducation Podcast since her junior year of high school. She enjoys writing stories of her life and conducting interviews. In her free time Renika listens to music or goes on mini adventures with her friends all around NYC. She hopes to major in journalism in college and become a journalist for the New York Times or a News Anchor for CBS or Good Morning America.
Malak Kassem was born and raised in NYC. She comes from an Egyptian family. She is a freshman at Pace University and is majoring in Journalism. She believes that journalism can lead to positive community engagement, unity, and provide quality knowledge and information. Malak’s internship experience includes The School of the New York Times, the Manhattan DA’s office, and published work with 826NYC. She is excited to meet professionals in the industry and hear their narratives of what it was like to achieve their career successes. She loves books, travel, and trying out different cuisines.
Carmen Lopez Villamil is from Brooklyn. Carmen likes well-planned gatherings that feel spontaneous, watching people in their flow states, listening to young and working people, and recording groups in their least comfortable moments. She is excited by the humanizing capacity of conversation and plans to spend her life interviewing people. By learning audio journalism, she hopes to gather youth to investigate inequity and construct sustainable institutions. She has worked in education organizing as a Fellow at Freedom Reads and an organizer at Teens Take Charge. She also makes pizza at the Yale Farm. She is studying the history of Indigenous student organizing at Yale University.
Salomé Noufele is a New York City native with a passion for activism and uplifting marginalized voices. Through her personal photojournalism and interviewing endeavors, she hopes to bring light to racial, social, and economic inequalities that have been ignored for far too long. Salomé recognizes the importance of journalism as an indispensable tool for the functioning of society and strives to be an agent of change. A first-year student at Brown University, she is interested in pursuing psychology and political science, as well as language studies. In her free time, Salomé enjoys playing basketball, learning how to play songs on the guitar, and traveling to new countries.
Betsy-Jane Paul-Odionhin is a freshman at Williams College from Queens, NY. Although majoring in neuroscience, she always had a passion for media and communication and debated studying journalism for a while. She is excited to explore the interconnectivity between neuroscience and journalism and publish her findings through the medium of audio storytelling. She was a participant in WNYC’s Radio Rookies initiative. Her favorite book series is the Harry Potter series, and her favorite podcast genres are true crime and book commentary. She hopes to start her own podcast after gaining the knowledge necessary to reach multiple audiences.
Pushkin Industries is an award-winning audio production company co-founded by Malcolm Gladwell and Jacob Weisberg. Pushkin has produced numerous podcasts that have broken into the top 10 on Apple’s Top Podcasts chart, including Gladwell’s hugely successful Revisionist History, as well as Against the Rules, The Happiness Lab, Broken Record, Cautionary Tales, The Last Archive, Deep Cover, Lost Hills and Apple’s Best Show of 2021, A Slight Change of Plans. Pushkin’s podcast hosts include Michael Lewis, Jill Lepore, Rick Rubin, Maya Shankar, Tim Harford, Laurie Santos, Khalil Gibran Muhammad, Ben Austen, Dana Goodyear, Jake Halpern, Hallie Rubenhold, Sam Fragoso, Jacob Goldstein, Brendan Francis Newnam, Lauren Ober, Helen Molesworth, Joel Stein, Maya Lau, Justin Richmond and many more. Pushkin’s audiobooks include the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Netanyahus by Joshua Cohen, Liar’s Poker by Michael Lewis, Fauci by Michael Specter, Heartbreak by Florence Williams, Malcolm Gladwell’s Miracle and Wonder: Conversations with Paul Simon, The Bomber Mafia and Talking to Strangers, Inside Voice: My Obsession with How We Sound by Lake Bell, and the upcoming Higher Animals by Michael Specter. Pushkin is dedicated to producing audio in any format that challenges listeners, encourages their curiosity, and inspires joy. Our work is built on principles of trust: respect, fairness, accuracy, accountability, and honesty. Visit pushkin.fm, where you can purchase our audiobooks and then listen on your podcast player of choice. Follow us @PushkinPods.
The Bell is a New York City-based nonprofit that equips public school students with the tools to tell impactful stories today and the skills to thrive in the media careers of tomorrow. Since 2018, The Bell has trained more than 100 NYC public high school students in its audio journalism and podcasting internship programs. Its student-powered Miseducation podcast reports on the city’s school system through the voices of young people. From the persistence of school segregation to disparities in access to school sports, Miseducation raises broader local awareness of educational inequities hiding in plain sight. The Bell’s student journalists have partnered with professional media outlets on long-form reporting projects, including Keeping Score, a 2022 collaboration with WNYC Studios that aired on The United States of Anxiety and The New Yorker Radio Hour. In partnership with Gimlet Media, The Bell runs the popular Summer Youth Podcast Academy, an intensive “bootcamp” program that gives students the training and tools to report, write, and produce a narrative podcast episode in just three weeks. In addition to its student programs, The Bell convenes the NYC Youth Journalism Coalition, a cross-sector partnership aimed at expanding youth journalism opportunities citywide. Follow us @BellVoices.