Pulitzer Center Update

Boston University Student Reporting Fellows Learn the Ropes

From left: Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health student Poonam Daryani, SPH student Lauryn Claassen, COM student Erica Andersen, SPH student Madeline Bishop, COM student Campbell Rawlins, Pulitzer Center program manager Akela Lacy, and Pulitzer Center editor Kem Knapp Sawyer.

From left: Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health student Poonam Daryani, with Boston University students Lauryn Claassen (School of Public Health), Erica Andersen (College of Communication), Madeline Bishop (School of Public Health) and Campbell Rawlins (College of Communication). Joining them are Akela Lacy and Kem Knapp Sawyer of the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C., 2017

In preparation for a summer spent reporting on global issues as Pulitzer Center student fellows, four Boston University students traveled to Washington, D.C. to take part in a series of journalism workshops and visits to media outlets organized by the Pulitzer Center.

Madeline Bishop and Lauryn Claassen, of Boston University’s School of Public Health, and Campbell Rawlins and Erica Andersen, of Boston University’s School of Communication, visited NPR, The New York Times Washington bureau, The Washington Post, and Vox to meet with journalism professionals covering topics ranging from science to national politics. While at the Pulitzer Center, the fellows participated in workshops focused on iPhone photography, journalism ethics, and interview skills.

The idea behind the Pulitzer Center fellowships at Boston University, Bishop said in a School of Public Health article, “is to help journalists get better at writing about public health and to help public health people get better at writing about data and research.”

Bishop teamed up with Rawlins for a reporting project on mental health in Guyana. Claassen's project focused on Zika and sex education in El Salvador, while Anderson's focused on pharmaceutical pollution in water.

Read the full article on the students' time in Washington, D.C. and about their fellowship activities.