There is so much bad news around about print journalism these days that any contrarian viewpoint seems dangerously naïve. The declining circulation of many of our best newspapers, the cuts in staff and standards, and the prevailing view that shareholder value is more important than quality are real problems. The transition to digital delivery is definitely a tumultuous process, a shakeout on every level of business and practice. But the only solution for minions in the news business is to take advantage of change any way we can rather than give in to the financial pressures. This is gratingly self-righteous counsel, yet it is also as true as it is obvious.

But that is not the main point of this piece. This is a column about some amazing young people eager to get into journalism who will inherit whatever emerges from the current overhaul. Their commitment and talent are among the most encouraging elements in any positive scenario about the future of news. The other day I went to the Overseas Press Club Foundation Scholarship Luncheon in which twelve college and graduate reporters were given $2,000 scholarships or internships to pursue their ambitions. As it happens, I sat between two recipients of scholarships in the name of writers I knew well, Flora Lewis, long time foreign correspondent and a columnist for the New York Times, and I. F. Stone, my one-time boss and long-term friend. Flora and Izzy would have been thrilled that these young reporters will always carry their names on what are bound to be impressive resumes.

Samantha Freedman received the Flora Lewis Memorial Scholarship sponsored by her family and friends. Friedman is a master’s degree student at the University of Missouri School of Journalism, a graduate of Georgetown, and is on her way to Latin America. The program blurb said her winning essay described a park in Chile that had been a torture camp and explored two citizens’ opposite perspectives on the regime of General Augusto Pinochet: “She would like to use her language skills—Spanish, Portuguese and French—and knowledge of Latin American history to improve U.S. coverage of Latino populations.” Freedman’s plan is to settle in Buenos Aires, look for stringer jobs, and work for a local newspaper.

Elizabeth Dickinson was recipient of the Harper’s Magazine Scholarship in memory of I. F. Stone, endowed by Harper’s publisher, John R. MacArthur, and since he couldn’t attend, he asked me to hand Dickinson the check. Dickinson is a senior at Yale who has made a specialty of African Studies and speaks the languages of Krio (Sierra Leone) and Yoruba (Nigeria). In the summer of 2006, she was an intern in the New York Times West Africa bureau. She is now editorial director of Global21, which is the coordinating group for student publication in ten countries on five continents about international affairs. She was editor-in-chief of the Yale Globalist, a quarterly which is part of Global21, Inc. She has also traveled to and written about Poland, Belarus, and China, among other activities of note. Here is an excerpt from her letter to the OPC Foundation:

I believe that an open notebook—and open mind—are the best ways to understand my subject. Traveling to report from rural Sierra Leone, I was amazed how much it meant to listen to a refugee’s tale, when no one else would hear it. . . . As a writer, I believe it is my responsibility to tell the story of the ex-combatant or the peanut farmer as much as the President or the big man. . . . I aspire to a career in international journalism that captures global stories through individual narratives. . . . Everyday as a journalist, I will strive to live up to the charge that every interview subject has left with me: to listen, observe and carefully report—and most of all, to do justice to the people whose lives underline every story.

Dickinson wants to go to Ethiopia and is looking for strings, and in the meantime, she’ll have that $2,000 check as a back-up.

Freedman and Dickinson have the idealism I recall a couple of generations ago from anti-war protestors and civil rights activists. But their calling is journalism, and they understand that reporting is different from advocacy. There is a lot to worry about in the future of the news business. But as long as there are young reporters like these two and the ten other scholarship recipients on their way to places like Cambodia or Israel, the problem in getting and delivering the news will not be a shortage of talent or determination. Whenever I’m surrounded by young journalists—the annual Livingston Awards for reporters under thirty-five is a similar setting—I come away with a renewed belief that the crisis of the news business is going to be resolved, but maybe it will take the heirs of Flora and Izzy to do it.

Peter Osnos is Senior Fellow for Media at The Century Foundation. Sign-up to receive Osnos’ columns weekly by email here. Read past columns here.