Respect publisher and editor Jeff Gaye is among 32 people selected to take part in the 2026 Kiplinger Fellowship at Ohio University (OU) in May.
The fellowship’s 2026 focus is “Saving Local News: A Practical Guide.”
“While this fellowship has a decidedly U.S. contingent, the loss of local news is a global issue,” Kiplinger’s executive director Kevin Z. Smith said. “With each passing year, the struggles to maintain local news presence in many regions is overwhelming.”
Gaye is one of four non-U.S. fellows, and the only Canadian, selected for the week-long gathering. The group represents news leadership at small community publications, medium to large market TV newsrooms, and a few niche publications.
The fellows will come from 17 U.S. states as well as Argentina, Canada, South Africa, and South Korea.
Speakers for the fellowship will include experts from The Knight Foundation, Rebuild Local News, The American Press Institute, the Institute for Rural Journalism, the Local News Initiative, Press Forward, and the Institute for Non-Profit News. Also featured will be news executives from local news groups in Michigan and Virginia. OU faculty will also be involved.
During the fellowship participants will discuss issues such as picking the best news model, making news decisions, fundraising, staffing, advertising, marketing and branding, subscriptions, using artificial intelligence, and profit versus nonprofit models.
“With each passing year, the struggles to maintain local news presence in many regions is overwhelming,” Smith said. “Where we’ve seen local news outlets collapse, we’ve also seen a rise in people being disenfranchised from their local government, voting diminishes, political crimes rise, accountability is lost and these news vacuums lead to widespread misinformation.”
Gaye says he’s excited about the opportunity. “I can’t wait to get there and get started,” he said. “It’s an impressive group, and I’m looking forward to offering what I can. But I’m even more excited about what I can learn from the others.”