Tips and Tricks to Help Prepare You for Covering Challenging Stories.

In journalism, you sometimes get difficult assignments, which can range from unexpected deaths to a rally by a marginalized community. So, how do you cover each of these subjects with the proper amount of respect while also doing your job as a journalist?
That’s the question presenter Ty Rushing wants to help you walk through. In his decade-plus career in news, Rushing has covered a number of sensitive stories and written about social justice issues, mental health, domestic violence and more. Throughout each of these experiences, Rushing has gleaned bits and pieces and developed solid strategies to help reporters tell these types of stories in a factual but thoughtful manner.

Ty Rushing is a Kansas City, Kansas, native who made a name for himself as an Iowa journalist. He broke barriers as the first Black reporter and/or editor at eight Iowa print publications across the state.

Throughout this journey, Ty has done everything from writing about his experiences as a Black transplant adjusting to living in Iowa to penning heart-warming features. He’s profiled and interviewed prominent community leaders and politicians all over Iowa and won a few awards along the way.
Ty has been featured as a guest and subject on CNN, MSNBC, Iowa Public Television, Iowa Public Radio, and other media outlets.

In 2022, Ty wrote, produced, and directed his first film, “Telling Our Own Story: Ending Racism,” in conjunction with Iowa PBS. The documentary was nominated for a 2023 Upper Midwest Emmy. He received the 2024 Greenlee/Kappa Tau Alpha Diversity & Inclusion Award from the Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication at Iowa State University.

Rushing is the co-founder and president of the Iowa Association of Black Journalists and previously served as chief political correspondent of Iowa Starting Line. He resides with his wife in the Iowa City area and is a journalism professor at the University of Iowa.