Learn How the 2021 Data Fellowship Can Bolster Your Toolkit — and How to Apply
The Center for Health Journalism offers you an opportunity to transform your reporting by teaching you how to “interview the data” as if it were a human source. You don’t need to wait for think tanks to come up with a report. The Fellowship will teach you how to find original sources of information and do your own data analysis to reach original conclusions about your communities, investigative and explanatory reporting that can lead to groundbreaking journalism. All this happens through a program that provides a week of training, reporting stipends and five months of intensive one-on-one mentoring. In this webinar, you’ll hear from one of our data mentors, Star Tribune Data Editor MaryJo Webster, about what it takes to have a successful application for the program as well as from recent program participants. You’ll learn more about what you'll get from this fellowship program and provide insight into how to craft your application and project pitch. This session will be worth your time whether you've decided to apply or even if you are just curious to learn more about the program. Read more about the Data Fellowship and topical priorities for projects.
Panelists
MaryJo Webster is a senior fellow for the Data Fellowship program and is also the data editor for the Star Tribune in Minneapolis. She started her career as a reporter at small daily papers in Minnesota and Wisconsin before attending the University of Missouri-Columbia to specialize in investigative reporting and data journalism. While earning her master's degree, she also worked for Investigative Reporters and Editors, where she polished her data skills and taught others. After graduating in 2001, she became the first data editor at the Center for Public Integrity in Washington, D.C. She spent several years as sports data editor for USA Today, then moved home to Minnesota and spent nine years as data editor for the St. Paul Pioneer Press, followed by a short stint as a data reporter with Digital First Media. She also spent 10 years as an adjunct instructor at the University of Minnesota's journalism school.
Westlake (April 11, 2020). All photos by Lexis-Olivier Ray.
Lexis-Olivier Ray regularly contributes to L.A. Taco, a James Beard Award-winning daily news publication focused on street level reporting. His journalism work centers largely on housing, justice and culture. In addition to L.A. Taco, his reporting has been featured in LAist, KCET, The LAnd Magazine, The Appeal, Hyper Allergic and RoadTrippers Magazine. Recently, Lexis-Olivier premiered a new body of photography work at the Mak Center for Art and Architecture in West Hollywood that focused on the stories behind the buildings and spaces that are being threatened by gentrification in Historic Filipinotown, where he lives. His 2020 Data Fellowship project focused on the unhoused community, the pandemic and the ways in which the city and county has responded to these crises. The series was published by L.A. Taco.
Rebecca Lindstrom is an investigative reporter for The Reveal, a weekly investigative program on 11Alive, the NBC affiliate in Atlanta. For 28 years she has told stories focused on social inequality, child and animal welfare and worked to expose corruption within our government and business communities. Rebecca has had the opportunity to interview several U.S. presidents, movie stars and corporate executives, but counts herself more fortunate to have interviewed those in the local community who welcome and trust her with the normally private and often heartbreaking moments in their lives. Named Best News Reporter of 2018 by the Georgia Association of Broadcasters, she has been also honored with a national and regional Edward R. Murrow Award and nine Emmys. For her Data Fellowship project, she will report on the mental health and medical challenges that have led to a growing number of desperate parents to relinquish their children to the state for care.