Award-winning newscast expands across Pennsylvania

An award-winning newscast produced by Penn State students became available to thousands more viewers across Pennsylvania as part of a streaming agreement with WNEP-TV, which serves Scranton/Wilkes-Barre as the top-rated station in the northeastern part of the state.

“Centre County Report” was added to WNEP’s streaming channel in early 2024. The half-hour show has regularly been named the nation’s best student-produced newscast by organizations such as the Broadcast Education Association, College Broadcasters Inc., the College Media Association, the Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, and the Society of Professional Journalists.

“This is really exciting and a way for our students’ work to be accessible to more viewers across the state,” said Steve Kraycik, an associate teaching professor and director of student television in the Bellisario College. “It gives our students’ work even more credibility, and their high-quality efforts have consistently proven they’ve earned that credibility.”

“Centre County Report” serves a dual purpose. It provides a source of news and information to the residents of Centre County and functions as a real-life laboratory for student learning to report and deliver news. The newscast is produced by students in the Bellisario College’s capstone broadcast journalism course.

The weekly newscast streams on YouTube and airs on WPSU-TV to 29 counties and 500,000 homes. In addition, “Centre County Report” streams in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia as the result of partnerships with KDKA-TV and KYW-TV, respectively. A similar agreement with WJZ-TV makes the show available in Baltimore as well.