Missouri Press Association
Serving Missouri Newspapers Since 1867
Two students entering their junior year at the University of Missouri School of Journalism have been elected as the 2026 recipients of the Rural Missouri Newspaper Scholarship.
The scholarships result from a partnership between the Missouri Press Foundation, the J-School, and the Reynolds Journalism Institute. Former MPA Executive Director Mark Maassen initiated the establishment of the scholarships in 2021, which requires that the recipients spend two years working at a rural Missouri newspaper following graduation.
The selected students receive a $10,000 scholarship from the J-School for both their junior and senior years. RJI provides $5,000 for a summer internship between their junior and senior years, and they receive $10,000 stipends for two years in addition to their salary from the newspaper. The total value of each Rural Missouri Newspaper Scholarship is $45,000.
The 2026 recipients are Bannack Skillen, a 2024 graduate of Rock Port High School, and Andrew Davis, a 2024 graduate of Notre Dame Regional High School in Cape Girardeau.
Skillen served a summer 2025 internship with the Atchison County Mail in his hometown of Rock Port. He wrote articles, took pictures and edited copy.
“Throughout my time at Mizzou, I’ve found I truly love this field, and I want to pursue working at a rural newspaper,” he wrote in his application essay. “I enjoy writing, photography and editing, and I would be able to employ all these individual pieces of journalism at once working for a smaller, rural publication.”
Skillen worked as a reporter for the Columbia Missourian this past semester. He has competed in intramural basketball.
“As a Missourian from the Bootheel, I understand the importance of local newspapers,” Davis wrote in his essay. “My hometown, Cape Girardeau, features the Southeast Missourian, which has spectacular journalists covering small towns and introduced me to rural community journalism.
“However, many counties in Missouri have only a single newspaper with a microscopic staff that continues to face the risk of closing. I want to be an active part of maintaining coverage within these small communities.”
Davis has written for the Columbia Missourian and Vox Magazine, developing his skills of story idea generation and long-form story writing. “Both of these outlets have taught me how to write a wide range of stories, and both have grown my skills within community journalism, which will allow me to excel in rural Missouri,” he said.
Alyssa Fitzgerald, a Boonville High School graduate selected for the Rural Missouri Newspaper Scholarship in 2022, graduated from the J-School in May and has accepted a position as digital marketing coordinator with Leader Publications in Jefferson County. She starts July 13.
Other scholarship recipients in the Rural Missouri Newspaper pipeline are Samuel Cox, a 2023 Logan-Rogersville High School graduate; Alivia Roach, a 2023 graduate of Jackson High School; Audrey Ellis, a 2023 graduate of Dallas Center-Grimes High School in Grimes, Iowa; Allison Boedges, a 2024 Hermann High School graduate; and Emma Jones, a 2024 Odessa High School graduate.
