Alan Weisman is a UA laureate professor of journalism and Latin American studies and author of the international best-seller "The World Without Us."

Other articles by Alan Weisman:

UA student reporters gauge Argentina eco-priorities

Driver/Transportation
Winroc Corp
Drivers Trades/Construction
innovative manufacturing
CNC LATHE SETUP Technical
Dynamics Information Technology
Systems Engineer Trades/Construction
PARKWAY CONSTRUCTION
SUPERINTENDENTS General
.
MYSTERY SHOPPERS Production and Manufacturing
QUALITY MANAGER Trades/Construction
SCHMUESER & ASSOCIATES
PRECSION MILLWRIGHTS

During June, this newspaper ran a series of articles about environmental challenges in the developing world, reported from Argentina by 10 University of Arizona students enrolled in an international journalism class I take each year to a different country.

Shortly thereafter, I was interviewed by the American Journalism Review. Isn't it misleading, I was asked, to teach international coverage to students when foreign bureaus and correspondent posts are being slashed? Doesn't it give them unrealistic dreams of romantic careers that barely exist in today's journalism job market?

I replied that in a world now thoroughly globalized by markets, economic policies, borderless terror and environmental crises, foreign reporting is more crucial than ever. Despite budget constraints that grow more onerous weekly, the University of Arizona's Department of Journalism, I explained, has actually deepened its commitment to international reporting by offering joint master's degrees in collaboration with the UA's Centers for Latin American Studies and Middle Eastern Studies.

The university's Institute for the Study of the Planet Earth has pitched in to help underwrite our field classes, as has the Magellan Circle: a group of UA donors dedicated to the global emphasis in education that their name implies.

I was surprised that a professional journal for journalists might question this, but they weren't the first. Earlier this year I'd been similarly challenged during a talk I gave in Seattle at Microsoft.

I'd suggested to my audience there that Microsoft and other Internet giants like Yahoo and Google have both a responsibility and a vested interest in easing the current crisis in journalism. Their online news digests, increasingly people's main news source, depend on newspapers and other news outlets for content, but they soak up so many advertising dollars that the number of reporters that media can afford to keep in the field has drastically shrunk. Distinguished foreign bureau chiefs for some of our biggest newspapers don't even know if they'll be employed next year.

This is especially dangerous, I added, because in a world as tense as ours, we need more correspondents, not fewer. Since I've never met a correspondent from Google or Yahoo or MSN during all my foreign reporting assignments, I proposed they consider subsidizing news outlets to keep bureaus in place, lest our world crumble because of a dearth of critical reporting.

"But why should we finance old-fashioned journalists?" a senior software engineer asked. "With today's technology, anyone with a cell-phone camera can be a reporter."

In reply, I asked him if he'd reached his position because of his training and experience, or because Bill Gates plucked him off the street and handed him a magic tool.

A journalist must learn to research and investigate, to place events he or she witnesses in context, to interview multiple sources, and to write clearly and accurately about multiple subjects. A correspondent must also learn to understand other cultures and languages.

It's true that we don't know what jobs await our students, let alone what forms journalism might take five years from now.

What is certain, however, is that during these increasingly trying times, everyone will need to know what is happening in our world more than ever. For that, we must keep training the next generation of journalists who will tell us.