STEPHANIE MURRAY: I really feel like UMass chose me. The minute I stepped foot on campus here, I felt like I belonged. The real thing that drew me in was the Journalism department. You can't go through UMass Journalism without somebody knowing your name and caring about you and caring about your work. I'm really close with BJ Roche. She's the adviser for Amherst Wire, and she's a senior lecturer here. And Kathy Roberts Forde, she's the chair of the department. And she teaches History of American Journalism.

KATHY ROBERTS FORDE: Stephanie is one of the most enterprising college reporters I've ever seen. Stephanie is going to be a journalist, there is no doubt in my mind.

STEPHANIE MURRAY: My first internship was at the Lowell Sun in Lowell. And my first article, it was going to rain in the middle of the week. And so I called up some local farmers to ask them if they were excited about it raining, and if it would help their strawberry crops. And it was like a silly article. But I worked really hard on it. And I was so excited when it got published. Amherst Wire's coverage of a protest after President Trump won the election in November actually got picked up by the "Boston Globe." So one 15-second video can really get your story out and launch you. The Roy W. Howard National Collegiate Reporting Competition is put on by Indiana University. And I am one of nine student journalists from across the country who won. And we're going on a 10-day trip to Japan. We're going to tour Osaka, Kyoto, and focus on Japanese and international media outlets in Japan. I am so proud to go to UMass Amherst. It has brought me to places in my career already that I never would have imagined. This country was founded with the help of a free press. And it's up to us to keep that going. And it's up to journalism students, especially UMass journalism students. My name is Stephanie Murray, class of 2018. I stand for a free press, and I stand for UMass.