Health Media Jobs and Opportunities: Medicare-related communications

Featured this week is an opportunity for a health communications professional with experience in writing for the over-65 demographic. Also, we list the most updated information on upcoming grants, fellowships and educational opportunities.

Our weekly job listings, previously found at the end of once-a-week Career GPS posts, are now featured in their own weekly posts. You can continue to follow Career GPS posts and job listings via RSS. To submit a job listing, please email knativid@usc.edu.

Featured listing:

Senior Writer/Editor-In-Chief (Healthcare), WunderLand Group
Location: Bergen County, NJ
Status: Full Time
Medium: Print, Online

"Our client is a leading healthcare company  looking to add an Editor-in-Chief/Senior Writer for Medicare-related communications.  As the Editor-in-Chief/Sr. Writer, you will be able to provide a consistent voice to our client's Medicare-and Retiree-related communications. You'll thrive in this position if you enjoy distilling simplicity from complexity, understand how to communicate in multiple mediums, and believe that people over 65 deserve copy that engages and enlightens.

As Editor-in-Chief, your skills as a steward of the brand and a writer will assure that all integrated points of communication are using the same type of tone, language and level of detail that is most appropriate for a Medicare-eligible audience. These integrated communications include; direct mail, web site, e-mail, radio and collateral. You will be called upon to understand the wants and needs of the over 65 audience and be their advocate.

Candidates should have at least 10 years experience in developing concepts and writing results-driven, integrated marketing communications for consumer audiences. The right candidate has a portfolio that demonstrates conceptual thinking, action-oriented writing, and brand-building. Our next Editor-in-Chief and writer enjoys strategic thinking and understands how to turn consumer and business data and insights into actionable creative ideas and executions. The ability to handle multiple projects is essential. Experience writing for a 60+ audience and/or for healthcare, Medicare, or financial clients is strongly desired."

Fellowships and Grants

George Polk Grants for Investigative Reporting, Long Island University
Eligibility: Applicants should have a proven track record as an investigative reporter. Special consideration will be given to journalists who have been laid off or are no longer employed by a news organization.
Deadline: Unspecified
From the Website: This program is intended as a resource for the reporter who always has wanted to dig into a particular topic or who has developed useful expertise – who knows "where the bodies are buried" – on a matter of public interest that may be local, national or international in scope. Grants will range from $2,500 to $10,000, depending on the duration and complexity of the proposed project."

The California Story Fund, California Council for the Humanities
Eligibility: Applicants should have California tax-exempt organizational status or partner with a California tax-exempt sponsor organization as a fiscal agent and be in good standing with CCH. California Story Fund projects must meet various criteria.
Deadline: June 15, 2011 at 5 p.m.
From the Website: "The purpose of CSF is to capture genuine and compelling stories from and about California's diverse communities, and to ensure that those stories can be shared widely. Telling our stories can help us make sense of our existence, give us a window into other people's lives, and make us feel part of something larger than ourselves. Sharing personal and communal narratives can enhance our understanding of where we live, with whom we live, and why we live the way we do. The Council seeks proposals for story-based projects that are informed by humanities perspectives, methods, and content; that reveal the realities of California and its cultures, peoples, and histories; and that will be of interest to local, statewide, and potentially even national and global audiences."

2011 Dart Ochberg Fellowships, Dart Center for Journalism & Trauma
Eligibility: Print, broadcast and online reporters, photographers, editors and producers with at least five years of full-time experience.
Deadline: July 27, 2011
From the Website: "An intensive program, to be held in Baltimore Oct. 31 to Nov. 5, designed to help mid-career journalists improve coverage of traumatic events. Fellows attend an intensive weeklong seminar program, including briefings by leading interdisciplinary experts in the trauma field and discussions with journalist colleagues, and attend the annual conference of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies. The fellowship covers all travel and ground expenses while attending the program."

Australian-American Health Policy Fellowship, The Commonwealth Fund
Eligibility: Mid-career health services researchers or practitioners who are U.S. citizens and have completed a master's degree or doctorate (or the equivalent thereof) in health services research, health administration, health policy, or a related discipline. Applicants should demonstrate expertise in health policy issues and track record of informing health policy through research, policy analysis, health services, or clinical leadership.
Deadline: Aug. 15, 2011
From the Website: "This program offers a unique opportunity for outstanding, mid-career U.S. professionals-academics, government officials, clinical leaders, decision makers in managed care and other private health care organizations, and journalists-to spend up to 10 months in Australia conducting research and working with Australian health policy experts on issues relevant to both countries."

California Health Journalism Fellowship, USC Annenberg California Endowment Health Journalism Fellowships
Eligibility: Open to professional journalists from print, broadcast, and online media in California, including freelancers. Applicants need not be full time health reporters, but they need to have a passion for health news (broadly defined).
Included: All-expenses paid seminars in Los Angeles, mentoring for completion of reporting project
Deadline: Sept. 16, 2011
From the Website: "During the Fellowship sessions, Fellows get plenty of time to discuss with experts, and with each other, strategies for covering health news with authority and sophistication. Between the two sessions and for three months after the second session, Fellows confer by phone and e-mail with veteran journalists who guide them through work on major Fellowship projects. The Fellowship will meet from November 17-20, 2011 in Los Angeles and from February 23-26, 2012. "

Educational Opportunities

Rural Health Journalism Workshop 2011, Association of Health Care Journalists
Eligibility: AHCJ members (apply via website)
Program: The workshop will take place June 3, 2011 and includes breakfast and lunch.
From the Website:"Even if your newsroom is in a bustling city, there are untold rural health stories down the road. So join us in St. Louis for this special one-day, no-fee workshop to help you find and cover health stories in rural America."