Student-run college newspaper in Iowa buys 2 struggling publications [Video]

• The Daily Iowan, a student paper for the University of Iowa, has purchased two struggling publications in Iowa to address a lack of local news coverage.
• Students from The Daily Iowan will collaborate with the existing staff of the weeklies to cover small communities in Mount Vernon, Lisbon and Solon.
• The move is seen as a response to the decline of traditional media, which has lost significant advertising revenue to big tech and social media.

With hundreds of U.S. newspaper closings leaving legions with little access to local news, a college newspaper in Iowa has stepped up to buy two struggling weekly publications.

The move by The Daily Iowan, a nonprofit student paper for the University of Iowa, is believed to be a first, though other universities are stepping up to fill America’s news void in different ways.

Students will work alongside the papers’ existing one- or two-person reporting staffs and put themselves to work covering the …