Sedalia To Host UCM Journalism Students This Weekend

This school semester, a team from the University of Central Missouri's student news outlet, The Muleskinner, is relaunching their Backpack Journalism Project.

The Backpack Journalism Project provides students with practical learning while covering stories for UCM's Muleskinner, along Amtrak's Missouri River Runner route. The students will gather, compose and format their multimedia stories from all corners of Amtrak's Missouri River Runner. This project is patterned after “Backpack across Europe by Train.”

The communities were asked to guide students to one destination or event that would be the key focus to start the students' story idea and then turn them loose on their own. Sedalia will host these journalism students September 20-22.  They will arrive and depart by train with Amtrak sponsoring their travel. They will stay overnight in downtown Sedalia on Friday and Saturday.

Carolyn Crooker, Sedalia Convention & Visitors Bureau, Kyle Herrick, Sedalia Area Tourism Commission and Joleigh Cornine, Sedalia Main Streets will meet and greet them as they arrive Friday morning. They will tour the Lamy Building, downtown Sedalia, and the Missouri State Fairgrounds during Mozark Fest.

Amtrak, America’s National Railway Passenger Cooperation, offers student passengers ages 13 - 25 a 15 percent discount on all Midwest Amtrak travel. Students interested in traveling with Amtrak have access to the Missouri River Runner, a 238-mile passenger train route spanning from Kansas City to St. Louis.

Get our free mobile app

The Missouri River Runner stops four times daily in Sedalia, offering students many opportunities to ride the rails. Amtrak offers a variety of amenities that students can take advantage of while traveling. Amtrak offers free Wi-Fi and power outlets in passenger cars, as well as a wheelchair lift on the River Run­ner.

The Missouri River Runner route also of­fers accommodations for passengers to store bicycles on the train for an additional fee. The Missouri River Runner makes stops at stations in Kansas City, Independence, Lee’s Summit, Warrensburg, Sedalia, Jefferson City, Hermann, Washington, Kirkwood and St. Louis.