From Our Archive
June 6, 1997
Scripps Howard Foundation
and
Columbia University Create
Scripps Program in Religion
CINCINNATI -- A new program created
by Columbia University's graduate school and funded by the
Scripps Howard Foundation will help prepare journalism
students to close the wide gap between the small share of news
coverage dedicated to religion and the much larger share of
time actually devoted to spiritual activities by the typical
American.
The Scripps Program in
Religion, Journalism, and the Spiritual Life will be launched
this fall on Columbia's New York City campus.
A
$150,000 grant from the foundation represents a three-year
commitment to the new program, which will build on the
Graduate School of Journalism's current efforts to improve the
quality of the media's religion coverage.
"This will be a unique
project found at present in no other journalism school," said
Bruce Kaufmann, director of development and alumni relations
at the Graduate School.
The Scripps program has
three main goals:
1. To educate a new corps
of professional journalists to cover religious subjects;
2. To
increase the stature among news organizations of religion as
an important "news beat" and to improve the accuracy of
reporting on religious and spiritual issues; and
3. To
bring together religious newswriters and representatives of
different religious traditions.
"It is alarming that
editors and reporters, who view themselves as chroniclers of
their communities, pay so little attention to the religious
issues that are of paramount importance to many in their
audience," said Judith G. Clabes, president and chief
executive officer of the Scripps Howard Foundation. "The
entire journalism profession will benefit from an academic
focus on this issue, and the Scripps Howard Foundation is
proud to partner with an institution as prestigious as
Columbia's Graduate School of Journalism to conduct such a
project."
The Scripps Program will
approach its mission with three specific activities -- the
offering of journalism courses designed to expose students to
the many facets of this issue; scholarships for master's-level
students; and seminars that will mix journalism professionals
with religious leaders in a focused discussion of the gulf
between religious activity and religious coverage. Clabes said
there is no journalism school in the country that is better
suited to the mission of the Scripps Program than Columbia. It
already offers two graduate-level courses in the field --
Covering Religion: BeliefsValues and Issues, taught by Ari
Goldman, former religion columnist for The New York Times, and
Journalism in the Media, taught by Dr. Rev. Donald W. Shriver,
Jr., president emeritus of New York's Union Theological
Seminary, and James W. Carey, former dean of the College of
Communications at the University of Illinois.
Columbia's campus is adjacent to both
Union Theological Seminary and Jewish Theological Seminary,
affording the graduate school additional resources and
opportunities for joint activities such as a dual-degree
program, exchange of students and faculty, and conferences and
workshops.
Dedicated to
excellence in journalism, the Scripps Howard Foundation is a
leader in industry efforts in journalism education,
scholarships, literacy, minority recruitment/development and
First Amendment causes.
Contact: Tim King, The E.W. Scripps Company, 513-977-3827