Cindy Dorfield Bruckman remembers scanning for a word search, cutting out pictures and collaging together a custom story from a single copy of her local newspaper as part of sixth grade curriculum at Cutler Ridge Elementary School in Miami.
She said there seemed to be endless ways to use the print paper.
Now, a few decades later, she’s helped place newspapers back into classrooms with the Newspaper in Education (NIE) program through Florida Press Educational Services and Mainstreet Daily News.
For her work, Florida Press Educational Services honored Bruckman as the 2026 Friend of NIE. The award came Friday at the Florida Media Conference in Orlando and has been given since 2013. She’s the first Alachua County resident to receive it.
“[NIE] is what fostered my love for journalism and news, so trying to repay it back,” Bruckman said at the award ceremony, which was attended by local news leaders from around the state.
Bruckman said seeing the newspapers as a child pushed her into studying journalism at the University of Florida before graduating with an English degree and then attaining her Master of Library Science from Florida State University. She used her degrees to work for 38 years at the Alachua County Library District.
Newspapers impacted her life in another major way. Bruckman met her future husband by taking out a classified ad in a newspaper.
Mainstreet and Bruckman partnered to give 1,900 special print copies to 45 teachers across the school district for use in their classrooms. Then the two doubled down to print 3,600 copies of Forgotten Front—a special section created by the Tampa Bay Times that Mainstreet distributed to Alachua County classrooms.
The Forgotten Front also turned into a panel discussion at the Matheson History Museum, featuring historians and education experts.
J.C. Derrick, publisher for Mainstreet, said the two recent programs prove students still enjoy experiencing print newspapers when they actually get them in their hands.
“It was so fun to see young people eagerly engaging with the material, opening up a new world ranging from local news and sports to puzzles and games,” Derrick said.
In the last three years, Mainstreet began producing 20,000 free weekly copies to fill the local gap and potentially kindle a spark like the one that lit in Bruckman decades ago.
Karen Tower, executive director of Florida Press Educational Services, encouraged newspaper owners, publishers and editors to get involved with the program and get physical papers into classrooms as an educational assist.
“We all know the data is there: newspaper readers become leaders; newspaper readers are more engaged,” Tower said.
Derrick said Mainstreet plans to continue partnering with NIE and local donors to give Alachua County’s students the opportunity to encounter trustworthy local news throughout their K-12 journey.