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NABJ Members Bethel and Smith win 2008 Knight International journalism fellowships

Alison Bethel Marquita Smith

NABJ members Alison Bethel and Marquita Smith are among five senior-level journalists named 2008 Knight International Journalism Fellows by the International Center for Journalists.

The fellowships are for a one-year period. Alison is the Knight International Journalism Fellow in Ghana, where she is assisting the print and broadcast media in its coverage of the country's critical December presidential election conducting journalism workshops and seminars as well as management training.

She is also co-hosting a weekly radio show on media ethics and local media's reporting on critical election issues.

Before becoming a Knight Fellow, Alison served as Managing Editor of The Nassau Guardian in The Bahamas and as a consultant for the creation of a lifestyles and community news section for The Bahama Journal.

Marquita is the Knight International Journalism Fellow in Liberia. Marquita is on leave from The Virginian-Pilot where she is Virginia Beach city editor. Before moving to Virginia, she worked as an assistant metro editor at the Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser.

Marquita has taught at Norfolk State and Hampton universities and is the immediate-past president of the Hampton Roads Black Media Professionals, Inc., a position she held for almost three years.

Knight International Journalism Fellows stimulate and nurture transformational change in journalists, media and societies around the world. Funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Fellowships program sends international media professionals to key countries where there are opportunities for meaningful and measurable change.

Working with partner organizations on high-impact projects, they build skills and enhance the standards of independent news organizations. By raising professional journalism practices worldwide, Knight International helps media make societies more accountable to their citizens.

Sandra Long new VP of Newsroom Ops at Philly Inquirer and Daily News

NABJ Founder Sandra Long has been promoted to Vice President of Newsroom Operations for both The Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News effective.  Sandra will be responsible for all aspects of the consolidation of the photography department, copy desk, editorial assistants, and photo toning functions, resulting in operating efficiencies for both newsrooms.

Sandra joined Philadelphia Newspapers in January 1984 as a journalist and has held several management positions including deputy Pennsylvania Editor, deputy managing editor, assistant managing editor, and recently Managing Editor/Operations for The Philadelphia Inquirer.  Sandra has won multiple prestigious awards including the 2008 Woman of The Year Award given by the Philadelphia Chapter of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, 2007 Trailblazer Award from the Philadelphia Association of Black Journalists, and 2007 Courage Award from the Philadelphia Chapter of the American Cancer. 

Former NABJ president gets diversity award

Dorothy Gilliam, the retired Washington Post columnist and former NABJ president who has been a long-time advocate for high school journalism and scholastic press rights, and the Prime Movers Program of George Washington University, have been recognized with the second annual Diversity Award from the Journalism Education Association, a national scholastic media teachers' organization based at Kansas State University, Manhattan.  She will be presented the award April 19 during the spring JEA/NSPA National High School Journalism Convention in Anaheim, California.  The award is sponsored and juried by JEA's Multicultural Commission and it recognizes exceptional multicultural approaches and programs that enhance scholastic media.
 
In 2003, Gilliam became the founder and director of the Prime Movers Program housed at GWU in the District.  The program is the first of its kind that directly partners professional journalists from major media organizations and college journalism interns with high school journalism students in a collaboration to enhance journalism programs.  Some activities are reconstructed from defunct programs; others are resurrected from fledgling operations.  While at the Post, she was the founder and first director of another innovative program to enhance high school media--theYoung Journalist Development Program, a hallmark scholastic media outreach project. 
 
Prime Movers, however, takes a broadened and collaborative approach which allows students to do journalism in radio, television, online media and podcasting, as well as newspaper production.  But professional journalists consistently say they, too, are benfactors from the unique mentoring arrangement with collegiate and scholastic journalists by learning the inner workings of schools, youth issues and, as often recounted, a lasting impact of revitalizing their own "professional juices."
 
Since its inception, 10 Washington, D.C.-area schools, 350 students, 30 college interns and 29 professional journalists have participated in enhancing journalism programs, student training and adviser refreshment. Gilliam has also replicated the program through a partnership at San Francisco State University and the San Jose Mercury News and last year initiated a two-phased program with the Philadelphia City School District, TEmple University, The Philadelphia Inquirer and KYW-AM radio that will create media clubs or journalism activities in 28 city schools, most which previously had no scholastic media voice.  The program is funded through the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.  An estimated 900 students nationally, from both urban and suburban schools, will have benefited in the unique journalism training.
 
"Dorothy Gilliam is one of those rare professional journalists who truly 'gets it' about the value of scholastic journalism to students, their schools and to the future of the journalism profession," said Reginald Ragland, the director of DCJEA, the local JEA chapter.  "She was a trailblazer with the Washington Post... a trailblazer with the formation of NABJ and the Maynard Institute.  And she has continued to be a trailblazer for quality scholastic journalism.  There aren't many who have impacted high school journalism with the same influence as they have in their profession."
 
During her professional career, Gilliam was one of the Post's first Black female reporters and columnists.  She covered the riots of the Little Rock, Ark., following the integration of Central High School, known as the 'Little Rock Nine;" was the first female president of the National Assn. of Black Journalists and one of the founding members, in 1986, of the Maynard Institute for Journalism Education.  She was a previous recipient of JEA's  Scholastic Media Citation, now known as the Friends of Scholastic Journalism, in 1998.