UO journalism center launches study of news, information and communication in Lincoln County

By QUINTON SMITH/Lincoln Chronicle

How do you find out what’s going on in your community? Or elsewhere in Lincoln County?

Is it via emails, newsletters, social media posts, word of mouth, a printed newspaper or online news website? What are the biggest challenges in getting the information you want? And, do you trust what you find?

Andrew DeVigal, director of the Agora Journalism Center at the University of Oregon, and his winter term “Engaged Journalism” class want to find out.

Over the past six years, DeVigal and his students have spent winter term delving into the question of community engagement and the connections to local news in mostly rural communities ranging from Hermiston, to LaPine, to the Rogue Valley and last year Florence and Oakridge.

The studies are designed to help understand how local residents access, trust, and share information.

“Through community surveys and listening sessions, we’ve worked alongside local newsrooms, libraries, and civic organizations to understand how Oregonians get and share news,” according to the Agora Center’s summary of its findings. “These community-centered projects combine surveys and conversations that help reveal how people find local news and how trust can be rebuilt.”

Now, in its largest and most ambitious effort yet, the UO students are asking Lincoln County residents to weigh in.

Beginning today, an online survey is available for Lincoln County residents to let them know where you look for local information and news, what topics need more attention, where you go to share that information and other questions. The survey will be open until Feb. 8.

There will also be printed copies of the survey at libraries and other gathering places around the county.

DeVigal’s students will also conduct research on Lincoln County, its cities and communities and in two to three weeks begin analyzing initial survey data and talking to respondents who agree to share more of their views.

“The students will dig deeper into responses … but also how journalism ties into the civic health of the community,” DeVigal said.

Then there will be two community forums – Feb. 28 in Newport and March 1 in Lincoln City – where people can come to DeVigal-led sessions to discuss local news and communication issues and ways it might be improved.

Research that DeVigal and School of Journalism and Communications interim dean Regina Lawrence have conducted showed that “engaged” or “community-centered” journalism serves as a push against growing polarization, the UO Daily Emerald reported this week.

“News has become really polarized at a national level but in local news, it is different,” Lawrence told the Daily Emerald. “People are more inclined to say they trust their local news environment, which makes these outlets more sustainable, but what research has also shown is that when people lose their local newspaper, what fills that gap is usually national news and social media and these things are more polarizing.”

DeVigal and Lawrence have also published two reports – the initial one in 2022 and a followup in 2025 – on the state of local news in Oregon.

The Lincoln County effort is being supported by the Lincoln Chronicle and Oregon Coast TODAY, the Lincoln City and Newport chambers of commerces, the cities of Newport and Lincoln City, the Economic Development Alliance of Lincoln County, Oregon Coast Community College, the Lincoln County League of Women Voters, Oregon Public Broadcasting, and several independent community members.

Results elsewhere in Oregon

The Agora Journalism Center was formed in 2014 on the foundational belief that the health of democracy and journalism are closely linked. Since then, the center says it has tried to be a “critical champion for the idea that professional journalism must become more participatory and collaborative with the public if journalism is to meaningfully improve communities’ information health and earn the public’s trust in local news media.”

In its six previous community visits the Agora Center found that:

• Across communities, residents report that information flows fastest through Facebook groups and word of mouth, even as accuracy varies;
• Residents appreciate the role of legacy or independent local news outlets and many want them to succeed, yet they describe thin staffing and a limited number of timely updates;
• Libraries consistently emerge as key hubs for reliable information, community connection, and inclusive participation, though many are under-resourced to sustain engagement;
• Schools are also key channels to reach families and younger audiences;
• Even as digital channels dominate, residents point to meeting rooms, cafés, grocery stores, churches, and bulletin boards as steady spaces for sharing timely, local information;
• Emergency and public-safety information exposes systemic fragmentation; and
• Across news sites, participants ask for reporting that is rooted in daily realities, transparent about process, and focused on solving shared problems.

• Quinton Smith is the editor of Lincoln Chronicle and can be reached at [email protected]

To take the survey on information needs in Lincoln County, go here