FREE READ: Tegna TV Stations Have 323 News Producers Thanks to Development Program

By Paul Greeley

NOTE: This story was first published on News Blues on July 31.  

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In June, Tegna’s 44 news producer draft picks gathered for a week of training in Denver at KUSA, Tegna’s NBC affiliate there.

The graduating college and university students are this year’s class of Tegna’s best-in-class producer development program called Producer-in-Residence.

Tegna paid for the students’ airfare to Denver and their hotel accommodation for the week-long training sessions.

“When I went to Denver for the in-person training, I was super excited because being in the room with 43 of the top graduating journalists in the country was kind of unheard of. I don’t know of any other program like it,” said Connor Alicaya, a Producer-in-Residence at WANT, Tegna’s ABC affiliate in Memphis, and a graduate of California State University at Fullerton.

“It was interesting to see how much they were willing to invest,” said Reinah McNeil, a Producer-in-Residence at WLTX, Tegna’s CBS affiliate in Columbia, South Carolina, and a graduate of Howard University.

“That’s one of the reasons why I was open to choosing Tegna because if they’re willing to invest money to fly us out to get that training, it shows that they are willing to help us grow.”

Noah Cooper has run Tegna’s Producer-in-Residence since 2020 in a new role as Tegna’s Senior Content Recruiter/Trainer.

The program was started in 2018 by Ellen Crooke, the now retired Tegna Sr VP of Content, and Patti Dennis, the also retired Tegna Sr VP of Content.

Cooper said there were 6 people in the pilot classes of the Producer-in-Residence program in 2018 and 2019.

These days, “depending on the candidate pool, 50 is the target number that we look for,” he said.

Cooper said the candidates find out about the Producer-in-Residence program through a variety of ways.

Copper has been spreading the word about the program on social media for six years.

Coopper said his team “visits more than 50 schools per year in person, so, the college journalism schools get people to apply.”

The relationships he developed with many of these schools and their professors often lead to them serving up candidates.

“I get notes all the time. I got your next producer in residence,” he said. “Our other great recruiting model are the PIRs themselves that have gone through the program. They’re recruiting their friends to also apply.”

This year’s class of 44 of news producer draft picks that attended the 5-day producer bootcamp in Denver started on a Monday and went through Friday afternoon.

“Storytelling is a big component of it,” Cooper said.

“We bring in the best people in the company to teach them the things that they need to know. They get a great, amazing, solid foundation to take back to their stations.”

That’s the payoff part of the Producer-in-Residence program.

Cooper has a list of Tegna stations that “want one to two or three PIRs at their station for the upcoming year.”

The PIRs that go through the program get a list of the stations wanting PIRs and they pick their top five stations that are available.

“We try to give them their top choice if we can,” Cooper said.

If they pass an interview at the station they select, that’s where they go.

“What we’re seeing is they come in supercharged from the training and they know what to do. They hit the ground running more than an entry level candidate,” he said.

Connor Alicaya has been a Producer-in-Residence at WANT for a month or so.

“It’s just a really fun experience to be able to come out of college and dive right into what you wanted to do,” Alicaya said. “That’s really fulfilling.”

Reinah McNeil has been the Producer-in-Residence at WLTX in Columbia for about a month.

“The training connected this whole picture of what local news could look like in the future to me,” McNeil said.

Cooper said the “PIRs sign a two-year contract, but most are promoted between 6-14 months to a regular producer role at their original TEGNA station or a different TEGNA station.”

Since 2018, the Producer-in-Residence program has had an 80% promotion rate from PIR to regular producer positions.

Since 2018, 323 PIR graduates have been hired as news producers at Tegna stations, with seven being promoting to news managers.

“The training I got in Denver was unmatched,” Alicaya said.

McNeil said when she started her job at WLTX as a Producer-in-Residence, “everyone was super welcoming.”

Alicaya echoed McNeil’s sentiments about his experience starting in the newsroom at WANT.

“It’s been really friendly,” he said. “They were really happy to have me.”

Alicaya gives props to Noah Cooper for “everything that he’s done for us and the amount of effort that he puts into making sure this program can be what it is. There are a lot of people above him and a lot of people below him that make this program good, but he’s the heartbeat of the entire program.”

“I am super optimistic about the future of local news based on those people that are coming into this program,” Cooper said. “I have the best job in the world recruiting and training with them and then watching them create positive change in their communities and in their newsrooms. I just love it.”

NOTE: Trainers at the PIR week-long producer boot camp June 29-July 3

• Raquel Amparo—TEGNA Sr VP of Content
• Javi Morgado—TEGNA VP of Content (Northeast)
• Boyd Huppert—KARE Minneapolis Reporter/TEGNA National Storytelling Coach
• Anne Herbst—KUSA Denver Dir of Visual Storytelling
• Kyle Clark—KUSA Denver main anchor
• Mallory Harris—KUSA Denver producer for Next with Kyle Clark
• Betsy Kling—WKYC Cleveland Chief Meteorologist/News Anchor
• Chris Bianchi—KUSA Denver meteorologist
• Marie Achkar—WCNC Charlotte Producer/Promoted PIR/Intern KSDK STL
• Cam Kauffman—WHAS Louisville Producer/Promoted PIR

Paul Greeley is the manager and a writer for News Blues.

He can be reached at Paul@NewsBlues.com or 817-578-6324.