University Press Club
The University Press Club is a student-run group at Princeton University for undergraduates who work as professional freelance journalists. It’s the only group of its kind run by students in the United States. Founded in 1900, it’s one of Princeton’s oldest clubs. Members write for local, regional, and national newspapers and magazines and cover topics from campus events and speeches to higher education trends and Ivy League news. Alumni have gone on to work at major outlets like The New York Times, The Washington Post, Vanity Fair, Forbes, and The New Yorker, and some have won Pulitzer Prizes. The club also runs a campus blog called The Ink that covers Princeton events.
Selection is competitive. New members go through a three-month Candidates Period, during which they write 15 mock articles across three folders and meet one-on-one with current members after each folder to receive feedback. Members are paid per story and work as stringers with professional editors on breaking news, features, and sports at Princeton and nearby areas.
On campus, the club hosts lectures and events for the Princeton community and sponsors the Louis Rukeyser Memorial Lecture Series, bringing well-known journalists to campus. It also holds dinners with visiting journalism professors and alumni. An Alumni Board provides guidance to the club.
Historically, the club began in April 1900 as a group of undergraduate correspondents who shared quotes and leads. The candidates process started in 1915. In 1979, members helped found Nassau Weekly, the campus weekly newspaper.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 20:25 (CET).