Stepping Up With Focus and Resolve - Wallace House Center for Journalists

Lynette Clemetson is the director of Wallace House Center for Journalists.

This is my 10th academic year as director of Wallace House. Over the years, among the key benefits I tout when speaking to journalists about our programs is the university as refuge, a sturdy port in the ever-turbulent storm that is the journalism industry.

As the last academic year came to a close, that didn’t feel like something I could continue to promise with any degree of confidence.

The Trump administration was targeting universities around the country, threatening colossal funding cuts and issuing demands that reached into governance, hiring, admissions and academic freedom. The University of Michigan discontinued its strategic diversity plan. Some departments were scrubbing websites of words and phrases that could draw government retribution. It was unclear whether international students — our own international Fellows included — would be granted entry to the United States.

The threats and absurdities haven’t gone away. The people in our extended Wallace House network — journalists, scientists, scholars, policy and legal experts — are prime targets in the strategic attempt to weaken institutions and consolidate presidential power.

Yet in the face of numerous obstacles, campus this fall still brims with possibility. The harsh realities of a raw and hostile national landscape are being met with expressions of creativity, collaboration, innovation, active listening, welcome and compassion. There is a tangible focus and resolve across departments and faculty, in student activities and community events that offer an ever-present reminder of what makes the University of Michigan special.

As our new Knight-Wallace Fellows move through the intellectual bounty of the fall semester, I am reminded time and again that the qualities that drew me here as a Fellow and that infuse my enthusiasm for outreach as director are no less true now than they have ever been.

But from our perch at Wallace House, each week we’re seeing inspiring evidence across our network of people stepping up boldly with both short-term assistance and long-term resolve.

The excellent work of alumni also reminds me that the dedicated journalists who Wallace House has helped to develop and empower over five decades are well-positioned to meet the moment.

And so this issue of the Wallace House Journal is built around resilience. Not naiveté or blind optimism. But the kind of clear-eyed focus and mission-driven leadership needed to respond to the multiple serious challenges we face with fortitude and vision.

We’ve all witnessed our share of feckless leadership over the past several months, from media executives and university presidents who somehow believed that cowering and capitulating might provide them protection. But from our perch at Wallace House, each week we’re seeing inspiring
evidence across our network of people stepping up boldly with both short-term assistance and long-term resolve.

In these pages, you’ll read stories of our colleagues reaching across organizations to lend financial, editorial and strategic support; about collaborations to build community-level trust and cross-border accountability; and about journalists pairing with scholars to rescue data essential to the work of both. We can all draw strength from these vignettes — and hopefully also ideas.

If after paging through, you feel inspired to reach out to a Knight-Wallace Fellow you haven’t spoken to in a while, or one you have never met, a Livingston Award winner you applauded, a faculty member whose research you’ve been wondering about, a board member you struck up a friendship with, or an engaged
community member you had a great conversation with at one of our events, go ahead and reach out. Check in.

That’s what networks are for. This is an exceptional one — and its members are not in retreat.

This article is part of Rising to Meet the Moment, a series from the Fall 2025 issue of the Wallace House Journal, featuring reflections from Knight-Wallace alumni, Wallace House board members and the Livingston Awards community on meeting today’s challenges with focus, resilience and resolve. Read more stories from our series:

Christopher Baxter, “Unexpected hope“

Lynette Clemetson, “Stepping up with focus and resolve“

Hayes Ferguson, “Nurturing innovation, adaptability and purpose“

Stephen Henderson, “Choosing Civility“

Samantha Henry, “The future of our profession: student journalism“

Tracy Jan, “News deserts and fewer watchdogs“

Margaret Low, “Game Over? Not a chance.“

Peggy Lowe, “Defunded, but not defeated“

Amy Maestas, “Building trust through community collaborations“

Kunal Majumder, “Defending the right to report“

Seema Mehta, “Why we keep reporting“

Rachel Rohr, “Swift action for the hardest hit“