Journalism 207, a series of online Zoom training sessions for high school students, is an initiative involving journalists from the Portland Press Herald, Morning Sentinel, Kennebec Journal and Sun Journal who lend expert advice and experience to students interested in pursuing a career in journalism.

Our first session on Monday, April 11 at 2:45 will cover how to find a good story, led by Vanessa Paolella of the Sun Journal and Eric Russell of the Portland Press Herald. The session will be moderated by Press Herald web editor Katherine Lee. Each reporter will talk about their own experiences in reporting, and we will finish with a question-and-answer period for the students.

Feel free to submit questions in advance.

Vanessa Paolella is a staff writer at the Sun Journal primarily covering local education. Before joining the Sun Journal in 2021, she interned for the paper twice and led the Bates College student newspaper, The Bates Student. Vanessa graduated from Bates College with a bachelor of science in geology in 2021 and wrote her senior thesis on water quality changes in the Androscoggin River from 1930 to 2019.

Eric Russell has been a reporter at the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram since 2012 and has been a journalist in Maine for 13 years. His favorite assignments are ones where he can leave the office and meet with people in their homes or their workplaces to talk about their struggles and challenges – and sometimes their triumphs. Eric grew up in Southern Maine, went to college at the University of Maine and worked in Bangor for eight years before joining the Press Herald. He lives in Brunswick with his wife, a school teacher, and two daughters.

Katherine Lee has been the web editor at the Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram for five years, and was previously the city editor for five years. She has worked at the Tampa Bay Times and the Tuscaloosa (Ala.) News, where she led the newsroom to a Pulitzer Prize in Breaking News in 2012. She is a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley, where she received her BA and MJ degrees. She and her husband live in South Portland.