Record intern wraps up prolific summer of North Shore reporting

All good things must come to an end — at least, that’s what we’re telling ourselves here at The Record as we say goodbye to summer editorial intern Penelepe Roewe. 

A Morton Grove native and rising University of Illinois sophomore, Roewe was the sixth student journalist to embed with The Record’s newsroom as part of its paid summer internship program. 

She kept busy covering the North Shore these past few months, reporting 40 stories on everything from Highland Park’s Bitter Jester Music Festival to Winnetka’s viral “PE guy” to no less than four different dispatches on the proposal for a tax increment financing district in Northfield. 

Roewe first applied to The Record’s summer internship in 2025, but having just graduated from Niles North High School, was not yet eligible. She instead participated in The Record’s fourth annual free Youth in Journalism workshop and remained in touch. 

By May, though she had already reported for Niles North’s North Star News and University of Illinois’ Daily Illini, Roewe recalled she didn’t know what to expect ahead of joining The Record — all her friends who had gotten internships had done so in broadcast journalism. 

So she was surprised, she said, when she found herself publishing, on average, three stories a week and getting so involved in the local community that she knew regulars at the Village of Northfield board meetings by name. 

“I feel like that’s an interesting part of it, is making these connections with the community,” Roewe said of her experience working in local news. 

“I would get emails personally like, ‘You should take a look at this.’ I feel like it’s nice knowing that your reporting is appreciated. And in a newsroom like this, people want your reporting.”

Some of Roewe’s favorite stories involved interviewing five different relatives of a local World War II veteran and hearing how much they cared for and admired him, and meeting Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan as he led a children’s poetry workshop. 

She’ll never forget when some high school-aged interviewees referred to her as Ms. Roewe, she said. And while she still gets nervous at times to report on proceedings in-person, Roewe said she is grateful she now feels equipped to cover live events and municipal meetings. 

The fact Roewe enjoyed the “constant rush” of writing on deadline makes her think she may have found the right field, she said.

She hopes to continue on with a vigorous pace of reporting articles while she studies journalism and political science at UIUC. 

“I feel now I can do way more stories than I thought I was capable of, to the point where I can balance multiple things,” Roewe said. “So I’m looking forward to pushing myself to do more.”

“I just feel like I couldn’t have lucked out any better than this, because it’s just a great opportunity to really drill in journalism practices,” she continued.

The Record’s paid internship ($15 per hour) is offered every summer and is made possible by local funders, including the Kenilworth Community Fund and Segal Family Foundation.

It is a 10- to 12-week program in which the intern works with The Record‘s editorial staff to produce meaningful community news for the northern suburbs of Chicago.

The Record North Shore is a nonprofit, independent local newsroom that launched in 2020 with a mission to restore reliable community news in Chicago’s suburbs. The Record covers the communities in New Trier Township, Highland Park, Highwood and Skokie.

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