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Summer Institute at ABC News June 2005

The Summer Institute at ABC News was inaugurated this year as a lead-off program for a major journalism education initiative created by Carnegie Corporation of New York and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The Carnegie-Knight Initiative on the Future of Journalism Education will be launched on May 26th, 2005 and will focus on both curriculum enrichment and an innovative reporting incubator for innovation called News 21. This one-time summer institute will be followed by on-campus summer programs over the next three years that can offer students and the news industry great opportunities for collaboration.

Five higher education institutions are participating in the Carnegie-Knight Initiative. They are the Graduate School of Journalism, University of California at Berkeley, Graduate School of Journalism, Columbia University, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University and Annenberg School of Commmunication, University of Southern California. Each institution has selected two of their top students to participate in the summer institute, which will take place over an 8-week period at ABC News' Investigative Reporting Bureau in New York City. The lead reporter in the unit is Brian Ross and the executive producer is Rhonda Schwartz. Nicole Gallagher, Director, News Practices, will be the executive in charge of this summer institute.

The ten students will have the opportunity to experience and observe all the constellations of the ABC Network from World News Tonight to ABC Radio to ABC.com. They will also be trained in ABC News ethics and procedures and on new digital equipment that permits both taping and editing of news material. Students will do significant research for the investigative unit and some students will be asked to travel for the stories they will be working on.

ABC will not be releasing details about the story or stories in which the students will be involved, before they begin the summer institute on June 7th but the general context for their reporting and research will be to help a 9/11 anniversary project. ABC News expects to be making full use of the skills, intelligence and energy of the students as part of the respected and competitive Brian Ross team, which has won major awards in the news business. ABC hopes this is a great opportunity for the students to learn from one of the best investigative teams in the business. For ABC, it is an opportunity to get to know some new talent.

For more information, please contact, Office of Public Affairs, Carnegie Corporation of NY, (212)207-6273