By RICARDO LOPEZ

Dagny Salas takes on new projects, hoping for the best and learning from her mistakes.

Her experience writing for The Daily Northwestern left her feeling frustrated. The Web site was mediocre and featured little multimedia content, Salas said, so she took a drastic step and left to begin a new publication.

She and eight or so friends started an online news magazine, which competed with the established student publication.

Their venture, North by Northwestern, has evolved and endured. It has scooped competitors with big stories, such as one about the disappearance and death of a Northwestern student that was later picked up by The Huffington Post.

The magazine has won numerous regional and national awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and won the prestigious Pacemaker award for magazine/broadcast/online-only publications in 2008.

Salas’ work on the project impressed USA Today editors, and they offered her an internship in Virginia. There, she produced slide shows, worked as a wire editor and produced Web content.

She developed her reporting skills further through internships at the St. Petersburg Times and The Hartford Courant. She has worked on an investigative piece about the contamination of groundwater and as a general assignment reporter. This summer she will work as a Metro intern at The Washington Post.

Salas believes her success is the result of her innovation and tenacity. Young journalists, she says, are fighting for a new way of thinking in an uncertain industry.