At the end of the previous school year, The Post’s executive editors, including Jackson McCoy, Sophia Rooksberry, Alexandra Hopkins and I, applied for a grant from the Solutions Journalism Network to expand the reach and impact of solutions-based storytelling in Southeast Ohio. After a competitive review process, The Post was awarded $7,500 to pursue a reporting project of our choice centered on solutions journalism.
Our newsroom is choosing to focus on one of the region’s most pressing and persistent challenges: the opioid epidemic in Southeast Ohio. Although this crisis has long been documented through statistics and breaking news, our goal is to go beyond the numbers.
Through this project, we aim to tell stories about the people and organizations confronting the problem head-on, the local leaders, recovery advocates, treatment centers and families searching for pathways to healing. We want to understand not only what’s being tried, but also how it’s working, what results are emerging and what lessons can be learned along the way.
This approach, known as solutions journalism, focuses on rigorous, evidence-based reporting about responses to social problems. It’s important to note this approach is not advocacy, nor is it sugarcoating reality. Instead, it’s a method of journalism that asks how communities are addressing challenges and what can be learned from their efforts. Solutions journalism emphasizes the same level of accountability and skepticism as traditional reporting, but it widens the lens to include innovation, progress and the complexity of real-world solutions.
As a newsroom of student journalists, we understand this project is an ambitious undertaking. We are balancing coursework, internships, jobs and the demands of a 24-hour newsroom. But we also believe The Post’s mission extends far beyond campus lines.
For more than a century, The Post has covered life at Ohio University, yet we know it’s just as important to move beyond campus lines and into the communities surrounding us. Covering Athens and the Greater Appalachian region means understanding our neighbors’ histories, struggles and resilience.
Athens County, home to more than 63,000 residents, continues to face the effects of the opioid crisis, with an overdose mortality rate of 24.7 deaths per 100,000 people between 2015 and 2019, according to the Appalachian Regional Commission. Behind those numbers are stories of loss, recovery, persistence and hope. We intend to tell those stories with care, empathy and depth.
To carry out this work, The Post has assembled a dedicated team of more than 20 student writers and editors who will contribute to researching, interviewing and telling these stories. Their collective efforts will ensure our reporting reflects a diverse range of voices and perspectives from across Southeast Ohio. This collaboration represents the best of what student journalism can do: combining curiosity, compassion and accountability to serve a community larger than ourselves.
Throughout the 2025-26 academic year, The Post will produce 10 solutions stories under this grant. Five will focus on the opioid epidemic in Appalachia, and five others will explore additional challenges affecting our region. We will measure impact, highlight community collaboration and acknowledge limitations where they exist. We are publishing this letter from the editor to hold ourselves accountable to the community we serve, to make clear our intentions, our process and our commitment to seeing this work through. Our goal is not just to inform, but also to engage readers in conversations about what’s working, what isn’t and how Southeast Ohio can continue to move forward.
We also know we can’t do this alone. We’re not experts; we are learners, neighbors and storytellers who want to do this the right way. We aim to approach this work with humility, not intrusion, and to collaborate with those who have lived these experiences. If you are working on a response to the opioid epidemic, have a story to share or want to guide us toward more responsible coverage, we invite you to reach out. This project is as much yours as it is ours.
We are grateful to the SJN for believing in student media and the power of local storytelling. Their support reinforces what we at The Post have always believed: that journalism can do more than expose problems; it can illuminate the progress being made toward solving them.
Abby Waechter is a senior studying strategic communication at Ohio University. Please note the views and opinions of the columnists do not reflect those of The Post. Have something to say? Email Abby at aw087421@ohio.edu.
