Research Shows Journalism Training Has Impact, Press Freedom Evaluations Largely Consistent
Midcareer training programs for journalists have an impact on what the
journalists do once they return to work, according to a study of two U.S.
training programs, researchers from the James M. Cox Jr. Center for International
Mass Communication Training and Research reported at a conference in Brazil
in July.
Specifically, the researchers said they found evidence that journalists who attended international exchange seminars and journalists who participated in training programs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, "gained new ideas from the programs, learned of new sources for their stories and developed new knowledge."
The evaluated training programs are funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation of Miami. The study of the impact of the programs was funded by a contract from the Knight Foundation with the Cox Center. The Cox Center is a unit of the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Georgia.
The report of the findings of the studies was presented to the Professional Education Section of the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR), meeting from July 25 to 30 at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre, Brazil.
Cox Center Director Dr. Lee B. Becker made the presentation of the report, which also was written by Cox Center Assistant Director Dr. Tudor Vlad and Cox Center Research Assistants Nancy R. Mace and Marcia Apperson.
 |
|
|
Prof.
Daniel Hallin of the University of California, San Diego, and Cox
Center Research Assistant Nancy Nusser discuss the conference program
during a break between sessions.
|
In another presentation at the conference, Dr. Becker reported the findings of a separate study which showed that different nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) involved in evaluation of press freedom in countries around the world reach largely similar conclusions about which are free and which are not.
That report, which reviewed the work of more than 100 governmental and nongovernmental agencies involved in the evaluation and promotion of press freedom around the world, was presented to the Political Communication Section of IAMCR at the Porto Alegre conference.
Co-authors of the report were Dr. Vlad and Cox Center Research Assistant Nancy Nusser. Nusser also attended the Porto Alegre conference and assisted in presentation of the paper. The research also was supported by a contract between the Cox Center and the Knight Foundation and was part of a larger project on evaluation of media training programs around the world.
The study found that two prominent NGOs, Reporters sans frontieres (Reporters Without Borders), based in Paris, and Freedom House, based in Washington, conducted independent assessments of press freedom around the world in both 2002 and 2003 and largely agreed on which countries should receive how scores and which ones should receive low scores.
Also included in the comparisons were evaluations of the media conducted by the International Researches & Exchange Board and the Committee to Protect Journalists, located in Washington and New York respectively.
"These indices of press freedom are widely used by journalists and others around the world," Dr. Becker said. "Our analyses lends weight to their value and importance in assessing constraints on press freedom."
In the evaluation of the domestic training programs, Cox Center staffers interviewed 28 journalists who had participated in international seminars of the Salzburg Seminar, headquartered in Middlebury, Vermont, from program from August, 2001, through October of 2002. The staffers also interviewed editors to whom these journalists reported.
During the course of a year, approximately 1,000 professionals from more than 100 countries gather in an Austrian castle outside Salzburg for programs on a variety of topics. Beginning in 2001, the Salzburg Seminar, through a grant from the Knight Foundation, began offering scholarships to journalists to join the Salzburg Seminar. Journalists select a seminar of interest and applied for participation.
The Cox Center evaluated two related journalism training programs operated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Knight Public Health Journalism Fellowship, which began in 2000, and the Knight Public Health Journalism Boot Camp, started two years later.
The 10-day Boot Camp includes courses in statistics, presentations on public health issues, case studies and laboratory tours. The Fellowship begins with the Boot Camp and is followed by nearly four months of emersion in the operation of the Centers.
Cox Center staffers interviewed the 12 journalists who participated in the Boot Camp program and the six journalists who participated in the intensive programs in 2002 once the journalists had returned to their work assignments. The staffers also interviewed their supervisory editors.