Miles Bennett-Smith wrote about the Woz Challenge Cup, a Segway polo event in Folsom that's the brainchild of Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak.

Paresh Dave told readers about proposed legislation that would brightly color BB and "airsoft" guns so they are not mistaken for real weapons.

Lynn La wrote about Tim Pfeifer, a recent graduate of Christian Brothers High School, who survived a double lung transplant needed because of his battle with cystic fibrosis.

If you are a reader of bylines, you've noticed these and others new to The Bee. We have nine interns with us this summer. They're bright and energetic and bursting with enthusiasm. They're the kind of young journalists who make me confident about the future of news gathering. They've made the newsroom a little louder and more filled with laughter.

Scott Lebar, senior editor for investigations, worked with other editors to recruit eight interns to join Matt Kawahara, a UC Berkeley graduate who interned with The Bee since last summer. Lebar works with colleges and programs across the country, including the Kaiser Media Internships Program, which promotes medical journalism and is not connected to Kaiser Permanente, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which places young scientists in newsroom fellowships to promote public understanding of science.

These are young people who grew up in a digital world, aggressively pursuing journalism as a career. Here's a look at who they are and what they're thinking:

• Miles Bennett-Smith, a Stanford student from Penryn, plays the violin in an Irish band: "There is a great joy to be found in finishing off a story and knowing you are a foundation for others' knowledge and information."

• Paresh Dave, a USC student, hopes to complete a triathlon before graduation: "I like to bring together information scattered in different places, draw connections and share meaningful insights with others."

• Max Ehrenfreund, a Yale student who has studied Japanese: "It's too easy to wind up spending every day thinking about the same things or talking to the same kinds of people. Working at a newspaper gives you perspective on the life of a community and everyone who lives in it."

• Lynn La is a Kaiser intern from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism: "One day I can be learning about cystic fibrosis, the next day I'm asking someone about immigration law. It's almost as if I can continue my formal education by meeting interesting people, plus I don't have to pay tuition."

• Elizabeth Lester is an AAAS fellow from the University of Washington, where she earned her Ph.D. in molecular and cellular biology: "Science is a pretty cool job, but … my mind chronically strayed from my experiments to arts, politics and culture. … I wanted to think about the science embedded in everyday life."

• Whitney Mountain is a graduate student at Stanford: "I wanted to be on Broadway, but my dad thought that might not be a very practical profession, so what did he do? He suggested journalism in this tumultuous time. … I fell in love with grammar and style, and have been unable to tear myself away from the written word."

• Ben Schenkel is getting his degree in ethics, politics and economics at Yale University, and has been a finalist on "Teen Jeopardy!": "Journalism lets me indulge my lifelong nosiness, that desire I've always had to know what's going on and why. The real satisfaction comes with spreading that information to a larger segment of the public, seeing how they react, and setting off a conversation."

• Andri Tambunan graduated from California State University, Sacramento, and is a photographer: He "believes photography is a catalyst for positive social change."

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Reach Executive Editor Joyce Terhaar at (916) 321-1004.

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