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Twenty UTampa students are learning this semester what it takes to be one of Florida’s most trusted experts in the most trying of times — a weather reporter during a hurricane.

Assistant Professor of Communication Sohana Nasrin is teaching a special topics course in journalism, called “Hurricane Reporting,” in which students study historical news coverage of major storms like hurricanes Katrina, Irma and Michael, and apply science journalism and crisis communication strategies to produce accurate, ethical and accessible stories. When storms develop in real time, like Hurricane Erin did recently, students analyze current outlets, including citizen journalism in TikTok videos. They study community-centered storytelling and will write their own, 2,000-word investigative piece.

Nasrin expects her students will be busy, even though no major storm (as of this printing) has threatened Florida this year.

“Hurricane season lasts all of the fall semester, almost,” she said, mentioning how last year, hurricanes interrupted classes twice, causing students to evacuate for Hurricane Helene in late September and again just two weeks later for Hurricane Milton.

The class is open to students from all majors, and many enrolled come from environmental studies, advertising and public relations, and journalism. Reasons for taking the course vary, but ultimately, students expect it will help prepare them for their careers.

Nicole Droeger-Stephens ’26, who wants to be a broadcast journalist, said she’s always been interested in hurricanes.

“I am an adrenaline junkie,” she said. “So anything that people may consider too dangerous to report on, I always have my eyes open to because I like to do that stuff. I like to bring awareness, to help ease tensions when there are some, and to just know what’s going on,” she said.

Fellow journalism major Faith Montalvo ’25 said she knows that in a newsroom, when a storm is approaching, it means all hands on deck.

“No matter what I get into, I know that it’s going to be really valuable to have this experience of reporting on a hurricane for this class, for the student newspaper and knowing how to communicate to people in crisis,” she said.

In one class early in the semester, Nasrin showed a video from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to analyze how scientific information was communicated to the audience and the visuals that were used.

She asked the students to imagine they were journalists in Florida, and that this NOAA video was the first piece of information they received ahead of a developing storm. What would be their first step in getting the story out?

A few hands went up.

“Fact check with text,” one student said.

“Get a reputable source,” said another.

“What about citizen journalists?” Nasrin asked. “Would you talk to them? Are they credible?”

Later, the class discussed “spaghetti models,” as the familiar lines that map storm projections are called, and they compared a couple of TikTok videos of related storm coverage. In one, an amateur weather “reporter” discussed a storm’s trajectory; in the other, a storm chaser showed and commented on a storm’s destruction.

“I know you guys get most of your news from TikTok,” Nasrin joked.

But maybe, because of this class, not for much longer.