melissa, Author at Wallace House Center for Journalists

2016 Livingston Winners Announced

June 14, 2016November 30, 2016

Stories about re-segregation and the neglect of black students, the predatory practices of Warren Buffet’s mobile-home empire, and the spread of pro-Kremlin propaganda on social media won the 2016 Livingston Awards. The $10,000 prizes for journalists under the age of 35 are the largest all-media, general-reporting prizes in the country.

The Livingston Awards also honor an on-the-job mentor with a $5,000 prize named for the late Richard M. Clurman, former chief of correspondents for Time-Life Service (1960-1969) and originator of the Livingston Awards.

Funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the University of Michigan to support a new emphasis on digital media efforts, the program continues to see an increase in digital submissions, with 21-percent more than in 2015. Since the funding initiative began two years ago, the number of digital entries increased 125 percent. The overall number of entries increased 53 percent.

Livingston judges Dean Baquet of The New York Times, John Harris of POLITICO, Kara Swisher of Recode and Code Conference, and Ken Auletta of The New Yorker introduced the winners at a luncheon in New York City.

“The judges have a remarkable record in singling out for early recognition journalists who go on to leadership, including Thomas Friedman, Christiane Amanpour and David Remnick,” said Charles R. Eisendrath, founding director of the program at the University of Michigan. “Adding a prize for mentors who provide indispensable guidance at critical moments in a developing career help complete an important circle of celebration.”

The 2016 winners for work published in 2015 are:

Local Reporting

Lisa Gartner, 28, Michael LaForgia, 32 and Nathaniel Lash, 24, of Tampa Bay Times, for “Failure Factories,” an investigation into the high failure rates and violence in five Florida elementary schools.

In 2007, the Pinellas County School Board voted to end racial integration and then failed to deliver on promises of more money, staff and resources to re-segregated schools. Analyzing mountains of data and interviewing more than 100 parents, students, teachers and administrators, the reporters found the five elementary schools had more violent incidents than all of Pinellas County’s other 17 high schools combined.

“We wanted to dig deeper into why our black students were failing at the worst rates in the state,” says Gartner, the Times’ education reporter. “The data led us to what the story was: these five schools and the 2007 vote.”

National Reporting

Mike Baker, 31, of The Seattle Times and Daniel Wagner, 34, of The Center for Public Integrity and BuzzFeed News, for “The Mobile-Home Trap,” an investigation into the predatory practices of Warren Buffet’s mobile-home empire. The series revealed how Clayton Homes, a part of the Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate, and its lending subsidiaries target minority homebuyers and lock them into ruinous high-interest loans.

“Our story showed that Clayton had not reinvented and perfected mobile-home lending, but instead had quietly bought up much of the rest of the industry, creating a near monopoly in many markets,” says Daniel Wagner. “In addition, it showed how reverse redlining, a practice typically associated with lending to urban minorities, is a serious problem in rural areas.”

International Reporting

Adrian Chen, 31, of The New York Times Magazine, for “The Agency,” an investigation into an internet trolling organization located in St. Petersburg, Russia, responsible for spreading pro-Kremlin propaganda and manufacturing false stories about unrest and disaster in the United States.

“The Russian government has been successful at using the internet to discredit political opposition and spread pro-government propaganda,” says Chen. “We think of the internet as enabling revolutions and protests, but it seems equally useful as a technology of government control.”

On-the-Job Mentoring

Charles R. Eisendrath received the Richard M. Clurman Award for his dedication to mentoring young journalists. A former Time correspondent based in Washington D.C., London, Paris and Buenos Aires, Eisendrath came to the University of Michigan as a Journalism Fellow in 1974. He stayed to join the University faculty and later head the master’s program for journalism. In 1980, Richard Clurman asked Eisendrath to design and direct the Livingston Awards. In 1986, Eisendrath became the third director of the Michigan Journalism Fellowships and transformed a financially strapped sabbatical program into the prestigious, globetrotting Knight-Wallace Fellowships and built a $60 million endowment to maintain them in perpetuity. For four decades, he positively influenced the careers and lives of hundreds of journalists. Eisendrath, who is retiring, will donate his prize money to the Livingston Awards endowment.

In addition to Auletta, Baquet, Harris and Swisher, the Livingston judging panel includes Christiane Amanpour, CNN’s chief international correspondent and host of “Amanpour;” Ellen Goodman, author and co-founder of The Conversation Project; Clarence Page, syndicated columnist and editorial board member of the Chicago Tribune; and Anna Quindlen, author.

Livingston Awards Finalists Move to Final Round of Judging

May 3, 2016June 13, 2016

The Livingston Awards for Young Journalists and the University of Michigan announce the 2016 finalists in local, national and international reporting. The finalists, who represent the top ten percent of entries received, will move to the final round of judging. The awards honor the best professionals under the age of 35 in traditional and new forms of journalism.

Funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the University of Michigan to support a new emphasis on digital media efforts, the program continues to see an increase in digital submissions, with a 20 percent increase in digital entries over last year. Since the funding initiative began three years ago, digital entries increased 170 percent and overall entries increased 65 percent.

The Livingston Awards national judging panel reviews all final entries and meets in person to select the winners in local, national and international reporting. The national judges are Christiane Amanpour, host of CNN International’s “Amanpour” and chief international correspondent for CNN; Ken Auletta, media and communications writer for The New Yorker; Dean Baquet, executive editor, The New York Times; Ellen Goodman, author, co-founder and director of The Conversation Project; John Harris, editor-in-chief, POLITICO; Clarence Page, syndicated columnist; Anna Quindlen, author; and Kara Swisher, executive editor, Re/code, host of Re/code Decode podcast and co-executive producer of Code Conference.

“Being named a finalist signifies high achievement and the promise of more and even better things to come,” said Charles Eisendrath, Livingston Awards founding director. “Each year, the judging process begins with a reading out of the names, titles and subjects of this fine work. Then follows a discussion among the judges that I consider the best seminar of the year about the ingredients of great journalism, no matter in which branch of the media.”

The national judges will introduce the winners on June 8, 2016, at a New York City luncheon.

Following are the 2016 finalists.

International Reporting:

Jake Abrahamson, Sierra Magazine
Adrian Chen, The New York Times Magazine
Joseph Goldstein, The New York Times
Brooke Jarvis, The California Sunday Magazine
Azmat Khan, BuzzFeed News
Natasha Khan and Hui Li, Bloomberg News
Simon Ostrovsky, VICE News
Jennifer Percy, The New York Times Magazine
J. Weston Phippen, The Atlantic
Scott Sayare, Harper’s Magazine
Kevin Sieff, The Washington Post
Christian Stephen, Freelance Society Productions
Alice Su, Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and The Atlantic

National Reporting:

Rachel Aviv, The New Yorker
Mike Baker and Daniel Wagner, The Seattle Times, The Center for Public Integrity and BuzzFeed News
Caitlin Dickerson, NPR
Catherine Dunn, International Business Times
Robert Faturechi, ProPublica
David Ferry, Mother Jones
Alissa Figueroa and Connie Fossi, Fusion
Azeen Ghorayshi, BuzzFeed News
Dana Goldstein, The Marshall Project in partnership with Slate
Michael Grabell and Lena Groeger, ProPublica
Lindsey Konkel, Newsweek
Jeff Larson, ProPublica
Dana Liebelson, The Huffington Post
Dan Lieberman, Fusion
Rachel Monroe, Matter
Tricia L. Nadolny, The Philadelphia Inquirer
Anahad O’Connor, The New York Times
Steve Reilly, USA Today
Alysia Santo, The Marshall Project
Eli Saslow, The Washington Post
Joseph Walker, The Wall Street Journal

Local Reporting:

Jonathan Blitzer, The Oxford American
Susanne Cervenka, Asbury Park Press
Justin Fenton, The Baltimore Sun
Jessica Floum, Sarasota Herald Tribune
Gus Garcia-Roberts, Newsday (Long Island, NY)
Caitlin Gibson, The Washington Post
Mike Hixenbaugh and Jason Paladino, The Virginian-Pilot in partnership with the Investigative Reporting Program and NBC News
Mirela Iverac, WNYC Radio
Marisa Kashino, Washingtonian
Charlotte Keith, Investigative Post
Michael LaForgia, Nathaniel Lash and Lisa Gartner, Tampa Bay Times
J. David McSwane and Andrew Chavez, Austin American-Statesman
Jonah Newman, The Chicago Reporter
Cezary Podkul and Marcelo Rochabrun, ProPublica
Brian Rosenthal, Houston Chronicle
Lindsey Smith, Michigan Radio
Halle Stockton and Alexandra Kanik, PublicSource
Perla Trevizo, Fernanda Echavarri and Mike Christy, Arizona Daily Star and Arizona Public Media
Alexandra Zayas and Kameel Stanley, Tampa Bay Times

A Fête to Celebrate Charles R. Eisendrath

May 2, 2016September 5, 2018

Charles Eisendrath — **Knight-Wallace alumni, university colleagues and journalism luminaries honor Charles R. Eisendrath’s legacy to journalism.**

By STEVE FRIESS ’12

In a massive events space on University of Michigan’s North Campus elegantly arrayed with energetic servers buzzing around, Dave Farrell ’93 offered up a worthwhile reminder of how far the Knight-Wallace Fellowships have come.

Today, of course, the program is renowned for its international travel to South America and Turkey, so Farrell wanted to explain to the 400 attendees at an April 15 fête for retiring Director Charles Eisendrath his role in how those exotic trips became a part of the deal.

“Farrell,” Eisendrath told the then-Detroit News staffer, “go down to the university transit hut and sign out the biggest van you can find.” He did as he was told, returning to the newly acquired Wallace House with a cargo vehicle. A little later, Farrell drove the van “with fellows stuffed in the back” to Detroit.

David Ferrell — David Farrell ‘93 recalls Eisendrath and the Fellowship’s first
“news tour.”

“Our destination was to find a guy who nailed a hubcap to a tree and called it art,” Farrell told the audience.

From such humble beginnings, the program swelled along with the prestige of the Livingston Awards, and Eisendrath became an icon of journalism. No explanation was necessary, for example, for the cakes perched as each table’s centerpiece coated in white fondant frosting and bedecked by a candy bowtie. Over dinner, university administrators and faculty, former Fellows and other colleagues stretching all the way back to 1970s reminisced and honored the larger-than-life human nucleus of two of the profession’s most important programs.

“I have no bleeping idea what course of study Eisendrath pursued,” said Charles Wolfson, a Fellow from “CBS News”, along with Eisendrath in the class of 1974-75. “I have this vague recollection that Charles spent some time at the School of Natural Resources. Maybe he was on the cutting edge of learning about what we’d come to know as climate change. But he was probably trying to figure out how to grow more cherries per acre on his farm.”

Eisendrath, who came to University of Michigan from his job as a foreign correspondent for Time, would never leave. He taught journalism and took over as director of the school’s now-gone masters program in 1980. That year he also became founding director of the Livingstons.

One of his students, commentator Jack Lessenberry of Michigan Public Radio, recalled Eisendrath’s teaching style – which felt familiar to anyone who had been a Fellow. “Charles gave us some simple instructions, threw us in the deep end and expected us to swim on our own,” said Lessenberry, head of journalism at Wayne State University.

“In my 20s and not at all sure what I wanted to do with my life, Charles Eisendrath showed me how to be a journalist and taught me the important and most fun profession in the world,” he intoned in his signature NPR style. “He did more to shape me professionally than anyone else and has been an important part of my life ever since.”

Farrell turned his attentions mostly to recognizing Eisendrath’s wife, Julia, whom he described as “the diamond we found in the fellowship year.” The “program’s first lady,” he said, “has the gift of communicating in such a way that makes everyone she talks to feel as though they are the only and the most important person in the world. When you talk to Julia, you know she really listens and when she speaks to you, you know she’s speaking from her heart.”

Julia Eisendrath, first lady of Wallace House and den mother to three decades
of Knight-Wallace Fellows.

The tributes filled two hours and included testimonials from University of Michigan Provost Martha Pollack, University of Michigan Regent Kathy White, Council of Michigan Foundations CEO Robert Collier, New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet, New Yorker cartoon editor Bob Mankoff, former fellows Tracy Jan ’15 and Rachel Dry ’13, Wallace House associate director, Birgit Rieck and ragtime pianist extraordinaire Bob Milne, who led the outgoing fellowship class in a rousing original composition called, “The Man in the Hat.”

Will Potter, KWF ’16, spoke on behalf of the group – Eisendrath’s last crop – to explain how an Ann Arbor speakeasy called The Last Word would now offer an honorary drink, the “Thunderous Round,” which is made of Traverse City whiskey, cherry liqueur, agave syrup, bitters and “a splash of mediocre sherry.” Eisendrath’s evaluation of the seminar offering at Wallace House.

To end the festivities, Eisendrath called up each Wallace House staff member to thank them with gifts and praise for their longtime support, and introduced the incoming Wallace House director, Lynette Clemetson. A Fellow in 2009-10 and most recently a senior director at NPR, she donned the chestnut-hued Worth & Worth straw Fedora that he gave her as a “symbol of continuity.”

Clemetson used the occasion to announce that the Knight Foundation was pledging $50,000 towards an annual symposium on international journalism at the University in honor of Eisendrath’s keenest interest.

“To listen to all you’ve created, to be the beneficiary of what you’ve created and know it has strengthened me and my career and enabled things I did after the fellowship … to be able to come back is the greatest honor for the greatest man who has done so much for me,” she said to close out the night.

KWF12 — **Over 200 Knight-Wallace alumni came from far and near to celebrate with Eisendrath, including many from the class of 2011-2012.**

NPR’s Lynette Clemetson named next director of Wallace House

April 5, 2016May 10, 2023

Contact: William Foreman, 734-330-0474, [email protected]
U-M has a satellite uplink TV studio and an ISDN radio line for interviews.

Read the announcement in Spanish.

ANN ARBOR – Lynette Clemetson will be the new director of the Knight-Wallace Fellowships and Livingston Awards at the University of Michigan – two of the nation’s most prestigious programs for journalists.

Clemetson, senior director of strategy and content initiatives at NPR, begins her new position on July 1. She will succeed Charles R. Eisendrath, who will retire after three decades. He founded the Livingston Awards and led a $60 million endowment drive to permanently establish the fellowships. Last year, the programs were rebranded as Wallace House.

“Lynette Clemetson will further strengthen the University of Michigan’s engagement with modern journalism,” U-M President Mark Schlissel said. “The Knight-Wallace Fellowships and the Livingston Awards recognize and support journalists who are helping us gain a deeper understanding of the most complex issues facing our world.”

Clemetson’s news career has been as wide ranging as it has been distinguished. Her experiences include reporting about Hong Kong’s return to Chinese rule for Newsweek, covering politics and demographics for The New York Times, launching the website TheRoot for the Washington Post Company and guiding multi-platform projects for NPR.

“The programs of Wallace House are vital to journalism, even more so in today’s complex media world,” said Clemetson, a Knight-Wallace fellow in 2009-10.

“It is an honor to build on Charles Eisendrath’s strong legacy, the program’s international focus and its connection to the University of Michigan,” she added. “I look forward to expanding Wallace House’s role in supporting media innovation and experimentation and being a prominent force for good in sustaining journalists of all sorts in their mission, passion and craft.”

Eisendrath said, “I came to know Lynette as a Knight-Wallace fellow after having been impressed with her application credentials. By the time she left, I realized that the most impressive thing about her wasn’t the credentials, it was the personal qualities that had earned them.”

Since its founding in 1973, the Knight-Wallace Fellowship program has enabled a total 677 mid-career journalists from 35 countries to step away from their deadline pressures and spend an academic year at U-M, enjoying the freedom to take any courses that interest them.

The fellows – selected for their exceptional work, leadership and potential – explore new subjects and deepen their understanding of issues they have been covering. They enrich the campus by mixing with students and faculty, contributing immeasurably to U-M’s educational and research milieu. Numerous fellows have gone on to write notable books, win awards, develop and run journalism projects and bring distinction to their news organizations.

The program is also the only journalism fellowship that involves study tours abroad. In recent years, the fellows have traveled to Brazil, Turkey, Russia, Argentina and Canada.

“As a journalist and a news executive, Lynette Clemetson has brought passion and a commitment to strategic innovation to her work. She is the right person to lead Wallace House as a new generation of journalists seeks the opportunities for learning and engagement that it provides,” said Martha Pollack, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs.

The Livingston Awards, the largest all-media, general reporting prize in the U.S., are often called the “Pulitzer for the young.” The program offers $10,000 prizes to journalists under the age of 35 for local, national and international reporting.

“At the annual Livingston Awards luncheon in New York, 200 or so leaders of journalism attend. They come not for the chilled salmon but to be reminded that journalism is a noble calling. Many struggle to escape depression. It’s a tough time in the business,” said Ken Auletta, an author and media and communications writer for The New Yorker.

“Yet after watching young journalists humbly step to the winners podium and glancing at their work, the sun shines,” added Auletta, who has been a Livingston judge for three decades. “Beneficiaries of both Michigan’s distinguished programs become part of a journalistic community that pumps oxygen into a profession so vital to a healthy democracy.”

The fellowship program was founded in 1973 by Ben Yablonky, a journalist, labor activist and educator. It was funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and called the Michigan Journalism Fellows program.

The program’s second director was Graham Hovey, a former New York Times journalist who served in 1980-86.

When the federal funding ended and threatened the program’s existence in 1985, a team of prominent newspaper editors gathered a coalition of donors, led by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Eisendrath, a fellow in the program in 1974-75, was as a TIME correspondent in Washington, London, Paris and bureau chief in Buenos Aires. He joined U-M’s journalism faculty in 1975 and directed its master’s program in journalism for a decade. He became the founding director of the Livingston Awards in 1981 and took over the fellowship program in 1986.

In 1992, a gift from 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace and his wife, Mary, a former TV producer, allowed for the purchase of the program’s current headquarters. Wallace House is an arts-and-crafts-style home near campus. The fellowship program was renamed the Knight-Wallace Fellows at Michigan.

Subsequent gifts have established fellowships in business, legal, medical, sports, investigative, international and educational reporting, broadening the scope of the fellowship.

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Shoshana Walter and Ryan Gabrielson Discuss their Winning Investigative Series with David Greene

January 14, 2016August 30, 2016

The Livingston Awards and University of Michigan hosted “Guards with Guns: Are America’s Security Guards a Safeguard or Hazard?” at the Newseum in Washington D.C. on January 12, 2016.

Moderated by David Greene, Livingston judge and host of “Morning Edition,” NPR, Livingston Award co-winners Shoshana Walter and Ryan Gabrielson discussed the findings of their Center for Investigative Reporting investigation on the haphazard system of lax laws and weak screening standards for armed security guards. Their series “Hired Guns,” won the 2015 Livingston Award for National Reporting.

Watch the discussion »

Gabrielson, Greene, Walter — **David Greene of NPR, interviews Livingston winners Ryan Gabrielson (left) and Shoshana Walter (right).**

Matthieu Aikins Speaks at Council on Foreign Relations

December 1, 2015August 29, 2016

The Council on Foreign Relations and the Livingston Awards presented “On the Ground: The Dangers of Reporting from the Middle East” in New York City.

Livingston Awards winner Matthieu Aikins joined Lara Logan, chief foreign affairs correspondent, “60 Minutes,” and Sebastian Junger, contributing editor, Vanity Fair and author, “The Perfect Storm” and “War” for a panel discussion on the risks of reporting on conflicts and wars in the Middle East. Moderated by Kevin Peraino, former Middle East correspondent, Newsweek and author, “Lincoln in the World: The Making of a Statesman and the Dawn of American Power”

Watch the discussion »

Matthieu Aikins speaks at CFR — **Matthieu Aikins with Kevin Peraino (left), Lara Logan (second from right) and Sebastian Junger (right).**

Fellow’s Dream to Help the Deaf No Longer Silenced

April 13, 2015October 28, 2016

Ann Arbor is a familiar place for me. It is where I grew up and it’s the town I’m proud to say my family calls home. An interview in the spring of 2014 for a Knight-Wallace Fellowship at Wallace House, however, took me to a nook of the city just east of the campus’ edge and it changed my life. I walked into 620 Oxford Rd. unsure of what would be asked of me, or what I would say or do, after responding to the “What’s your dream?” query that I knew was coming.

As I sat at the short end of a long, rectangular table my plan to impress the nine-member selection committee surrounding me seemed to be working. I was using American Sign Language while I answered the first question and that was playing well. “When you do that, make sure you have napkins to hand out because they’ll all be drooling,” friend and former Knight-Wallace Fellow John U. Bacon advised while preparing me for this very moment. What I could not be prepared for was what happened next.

After discussing sign language, deaf culture and my experiences as a child of deaf parents, Charles Eisendrath lowered his head, peered at me and asked, “Have you ever thought about putting together your knowledge and passion of sign language, deaf culture and sports?” That question put the wheels in motion for a journey I didn’t see coming like a linebacker making a blindside sack. “No,” I said quietly, knowing my response did not impress any of the assembled panelists.

“Well, why not?” Eisendrath pressed.

“With the day-to-day grind of my job along with being a husband and dad, I haven’t had time to think about it,” I said, trying to defend a dormant dream.

“Maybe you should,” he fired back.

“Maybe you should give me a spot in this Fellowship and I’ll come up with something,” I shot back with a disarming smile.

“Well played,” University of Michigan President Mark Schlissel said with a nod when hearing a recollection of the aforementioned exchange during his recent Wallace House visit with the Fellows.

“And someday,” I told Schlissel matter-of-factly, “this will be a Michigan Difference commercial.”

Back when I began the fellowship my plan was to write my first book. Scotty Bowman, Mike Babcock, Larry Brown, Jim Leyland, Tom Izzo, Lloyd Carr, Bob Bowman, John Beilein, Mark Dantonio and Carol Hutchins—some of the best coaches in a handful of sports—agreed to help me. Those interviews about leadership and communicating will have to wait. Since my first semester individual mandatory meeting with Eisendrath, relentlessly pursuing a platform to make media accessible to my parents, my nephews and about one million people in the U.S. has become my mission. Attempting to make the most of an opportunity with infinite possibilities, a slew of experts in and around the University have set me up for success by graciously sharing tips and connecting me with other people, all of whom have been eager to help. Five students in Len Middleton’s course that focuses on creating a business plan are helping me put my dream on paper. A 12-minute pilot program was filmed on campus and has been reviewed by two focus groups of deaf people meeting at Wallace House.

A second pilot has been scheduled for April. Hopefully by this summer, a Deaf Access Media website and YouTube channel will feature a 30-minute weekly show that will give deaf and hard-of-hearing people news, business, politics, sports, entertainment and more in American Sign Language for the first time. The show will attempt to address the failure of closed captioning, which is in English, a second language for some deaf and hard of hearing people. In some cases, English is a distant second language. My plan is to expand to a daily show and repurpose radio and podcasts along with all forms of media for deaf audiences.

My project is as close to my heart as my rib cage and my fellow Fellows and the Knight-Wallace Fellows are not far removed. Each person, including the staff, who has the good fortune to walk through the doors at 620 Oxford has provided me with encouragement. Some have chipped in with their expertise behind cameras and at keyboards.

When our year kicked off with the Hovey Lecture in the fall of 2014, Bacon implored the new class to come away from the fellowship with something tangible to show for the opportunity. I’m thankful that with a team the late, great Bo Schembechler would be proud of, I will do just that this spring. I also hope something else Bacon said isn’t published for many decades. “Man, Lage,” Bacon said, shaking his head from side to side when he heard about my project. “If you pull this off, it will be in the lead of your obituary.”

Learning to Wear Many Multimedia Hats

April 13, 2015October 28, 2016

What’s the best way to get to know new people who share a common interest? Join a club. As we settled in for the first semester of our fellowship, we noticed a recurring theme in discussions at Wallace House: the growing need to be your own everything on assignments. We would have to become the videographer, photographer and audio technician on every story. The message came in loud and clear, over and over again: newsrooms are looking for more content to post on the website, on Facebook, on Twitter, and it’s up to us to be efficient providers.

With these ideas in mind, we started the Knight-Wallace AV Club. Think beyond the high school version; there are no film projectors or running slide shows. This AV Club focused on digital world problems including improving camera and audio skills. Print, radio and television journalists joined the club. Most had basic knowledge of professional DV cams and audio setup but some were starting from scratch. My biggest concern stemmed from past experience. After I had completed my former company’s training program, I went for months without needing to use the equipment and suddenly, I would need to haul out that box of gear, hoping my memory didn’t fail me on deadline. However, the club’s built-in mandate to practice together gave promise to committing these techniques to our long-term memory banks.

We quickly found that this fellowship organization needed a faculty advisor. New Knight-Wallace board member Jim Burnstein and Assistant Director, Birgit Rieck, found just the right fit in Screen Arts and Cultures instructor, Victor Fanucchi. He navigated around our busy class and seminar schedules to create a program tailored to our individual needs. Working out of both Wallace House and Michigan’s Instructional Support Services Media Center, Victor covered a different topic each week. Club members got the chance to focus on one area of learning: lighting, audio, composition or a complete overview of each topic. The same amount of time was spent on the science behind shutter speed selection as strengthening a person’s comfort level handling the equipment.

Television producer Eric Strauss said, “Even as someone who has already had experience using videos cameras, lights and microphones as a producer at ABC News, I found the KWF AV club very valuable. Victor was able to combine introductory and advanced elements in the same class. For me, the sessions proved to be refreshers and an opportunity to learn some advanced techniques.”

I am left-handed by nature. Working with Victor, however, I realized I was faster and steadier working with my right hand. Beyond learning from Victor, we learned from each other. Jason Margolis, correspondent with Public Radio International’s program “The World,” shared his audio knowledge. He offered tips for handling sound in spaces with less than ideal acoustics and how to get the best microphone position for interviews on the fly. Associated Press reporter Samantha Henry recounted her experiences as a multimedia journalist, reassuring us that with patience we, too, could successfully navigate this new way of covering stories from a multitude of different angles.

Even after completing the formal sessions, Club members are still in action. As fellow Larry Lage develops his project, a news platform for the deaf and hard of hearing, we are video documenting his progress and conducting on-camera interviews as part of his audience research.

Bottom line: the future favors multimedia journalists. As newsrooms rely more on social media to promote content and engage viewers, we can find more opportunities to extend coverage and raise our digital profiles by improving our abilities across all platforms. The Knight-Wallace AV Club brought us all a little closer to reaching that goal.

Contact: William Foreman, 734-330-0474, [email protected] U-M has a satellite uplink TV studio and an ISDN radio line for interviews.

Contact: William Foreman, 734-330-0474, [email protected]
U-M has a satellite uplink TV studio and an ISDN radio line for interviews.