The Daily Plan-it / Dean of Students Blog, Columbia J-school

TO: Graduating Journalism Students
FROM: Dennis F. Giza, Deputy Publisher

RE: Free One-year Subscription to CJR

DATE: May 13, 2008

Throughout the past year, you have received copies of CJR in your student mailbox. I hope you found each issue interesting, informative and useful.

On behalf of the entire staff of CJR, I would like to offer you a FREE one-year subscription to our magazine.

To accept, please e-mail me your address (referring to this offer) to dfg2 [at] columbia.edu. I recommend, based on past experience, you provide us a temporary or interim address rather than wait until your plans for the coming year are finalized. If, in the next year, you experience problems with your subscription, or change your address, please call 1-888-425-7782 or log on to our site at www.cjr.org and click on “Subscriptions” in the right-hand column.

The one-year subscription will begin with the July/August ’08 issue and end with the May/June ’09. If you take advantage of this offer later than May (and miss some issues) your subscription will still expire with the May/June ’09 issue. Around January next year you will receive a letter saying your subscription is about to expire and asking that you become a paid subscriber; we hope that you opt to do so.

Congratulations and good luck.

Message from LynNell Hancock, Interim Dean of Academic Affairs

Dear Students and Colleagues:

I am pleased to announce three major additions to our new media
efforts at the Journalism School.

The first is the appointment of one our most popular adjuncts, Duy
Linh Tu, to the full-time faculty. Duy (pronounced “Do” - see bio
below) joins us as new media coordinator and an assistant professor of
professional practice. As you know, he has been teaching here for
several years in the new media classrooms. He will intensify his
efforts to “webbify” our fall classes, and to integrate new and
compelling ideas in multimedia storytelling throughout the curriculum
in the years to come. Duy will continue to work with Dean Sree
Sreenivasan, who, as you know, has increased administrative
responsibilities at the school.

In addition, we have created two new post-graduate New Media
Fellowships starting this year. These July-June fellowships will
employ two students who will work closely with the technology staff to
help students and professors alike navigate the world of new media
journalism.

Our inaugural fellows are Kenan Davis and Dave Mayers (see bios
below). Part-teaching assistants, part-technologists, this year’s
fellows are both smart journalists with terrific reporting, writing,
editing and production skills. They will report to Duy.

Please join me in congratulating them. Kenan and Dave officially begin
their duties on July 1, but I am sure you will have other
opportunities to greet them before then.

(more…)

Attention Students:

Prof. Joe Cutbirth is looking for a half-dozen or so volunteers to work and hang out at Headlines & Headliners, the 13th annual New York benefit for the National Lesbian-Gay Journalist Association.

The event will be emceed by Today Show co-host Meredith Vieira and hosted by Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times. It is set for 6-10 p.m.

March 12 at The Times Center, 242 West 41st St.

A big part of the evening is presentation of thousands of dollars in college scholarships from the NLGJA student project to high school students and undergraduates interested in journalism careers.

As appearances by and support from Matt Lauer, Geraldo Rivera, Jeanne Moos and others on the event committee shows (at least Cutbirth thinks) you don’t have to be gay to be part of this star-studded, professional evening.

For more info, go to: http://www.nlgja.org/newyork.htm. E-mail questions and replies to Prof. Cutbirth at jhc2003 at columbia.edu.

Dear Students:

We are writing to inform you of a new way to receive writing coaching at the
Journalism School. Currently, the only way a student can get writing
coaching outside a class setting is if a professor refers the student to the
Dean of Students office for remedial coaching. We will continue to offer
that service on a limited basis.

But there was there was no mechanism for a student who just wanted a way to
improve his or her work, or just wanted to bounce ideas off someone else, to
get help from our coaches.

That chanes with what we are calling “Writing Coach Wednesdays.” On an
experimental basis, on Wednesday, March 5, and on Wednesday, March 12, a
writing coach will be available from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. in a classroom here.
Students can sign up for a 15- or 30-minute block of time during that
period. These are off-the-record, one-on-one sessions with no records kept.
Students can bring a piece of writing (anything goes: a sentence, a para, a
page, or more) and have the coach work on it with them and offer
constructive feedback. The students can use the sessions for any class work
(or for relevant freelance work).

Some things to keep in mind:
(more…)

Work Block Group Available

Location: Counseling and Psychological Services: Lerner Hall 8th Floor

Day and Time: Monday 1-3PM

For 6 sessions: February 25, March 3,10,24, 31 and April 7

To register or for more information contact Dr. William Sommer at 212 854
2878 or email wgs2@columbia.edu

FROM: The New York Coalition for Professional Women in Arts and Media

Call for entries for the 2008 Collaboration Award

The New York Coalition of Professional Women in the Arts & Media (NYCWAM) will present the second biennial Collaboration Award recognizing Women Working with Women.

The $1000 award aims to encourage professional women in the arts and media to work collaboratively with other women on the creation of new works. Eligible teams are those who have completed a work, are readying a new work, or are continuing a work in progress.

Applicants may suggest any form of creative collaboration. Submissions will be judged on the basis of artistic excellence and clarity of the proposal, with special attention given to those proposals involving more than one discipline and which reflect the goals of the Coalition: to advance women and women’s issues. The team that has been selected, plus two runners up, will be invited to present a portion of their work at an awards ceremony in New York in October 2008. Women outside of New York may send a designee to present their project. NYCWAM does not pay for travel expenses.

Teams of two or more women working together on a creative project may apply for a Collaboration Award. Applicants must be members in good standing of an organization with full membership in NYCWAM. Those organizations are: Actors’ Equity Association, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, Dramatists Guild, League of Professional Theatre Women, New York Women in Film & Television, Screen Actors Guild, Society of Stage Directors & Choreographers, and Writers Guild of America, East.

Funding for the 2008 Collaboration Award has been provided by playwright, Elsa Rael, and by Back Stage editor, Sherry Eaker. The first Collaboration Award was presented in 2006 to playwright Jennifer Maisel and director Wendy McClellan for their play BIRDS.

Applications may be downloaded from the NYCWAM website: www.nycwam.org

or by mail by sending a stamped, self-addressed envelope to:

The New York Coalition of Professional Women in the Arts & Media

P.O. Box 2537
Times Square Station
New York, NY 10108
Completed Applications must be postmarked by May 1, 2008.

For further information after reviewing guidelines and application contact:
Deborah Savadge
Phone: 212-592-4511 or 212-595-2582
E-Mail: Collaboration@NYCWAM.org

The Earth Institute at Columbia University has assembled its 2007-2008 Student Advisory Council with two students from each academic department who will assist in developing student and academic activities for the campus around the issues of earth systems science and sustainable development.

(more…)

As you know, each graduating student receives four tix for the CU commencement Wednesday morning and four tix for the J-school Graduation Wednesday afternoon. The students themselves do not need tickets, so they can bring up to four guests for each ceremony. These are two kinds of tickets for the morning and the afternoon.

Each year, we set up a paper-based ticket swap system. This year, we are doing a web-based ticket swap. If you have tickets to offer or need extra tickets, just post below. If you want to get or give tickets, as appropriate, please contact the relevant folks below.

TO SEE ALL THE TICKET REQUESTS & OFFERS: Just scroll down to the comments section (no registration required).

TO POST A REQUEST OR AN OFFER: please follow these instructions carefully:

If you haven’t registered on this site earlier, follow these instructions to post a comment - in this case, your interest in attending. If you have already registered, just go ahead and log in and indicate your interest, using your full name and Columbia e-mail address.
1. To register for this blog (you only have to do this once for all future comments), go to http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.
2. Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and Columbia e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “N/A” in the URL section if you don’t have a site).

Include information about the number of tickets and which set of events and include e-mail, cell and other contact information. And, of course, put your full name into comments field, so people will know who you are. [NOTE: Several of you have posted WITHOUT your full name! We have updated the names we know. Please use your full name!]

Once you have posted your listing as a comment, the DOS office has to approve it, which might take a few minutes or a few hours. We will work to approve these as fast as we can. Please be patient. Once approved, the listing will show up in the comments section.

Questions to dos@jrn.columbia.edu

MySpace.com is teaming up with The New York Times for its second annual “Win A Trip With Nick” African reporting competition, offering one college or graduate student as well one middle- or high-school teacher the opportunity to accompany Pulitzer Prize winning columnist Nick Kristof on an expedition to Africa. MySpace is creating a customized community - http://www.myspace.com/winatrip - to engage users in the contest and offer video from the expedition, raising awareness about the challenges facing strife-ridden African nations.

“Traveling through Asia and Africa when I was in college was a turning point in my life,” said New York Times’ op-ed columnist and award winning journalist, Nick Kristof. “My hope is that the student and teacher who join me this summer will be similarly affected and will share their discoveries about Africa and its people with their peers and their students.”

“MySpace’s community is extremely passionate about social issues on a local and global level,” said Chris DeWolfe, CEO of MySpace. “MySpace users want more opportunities to make a positive impact on the world and we’re empowering them to do just that. MySpace is proud to be a part of Mr. Kristof’s extraordinary reporting project in Africa.”

Beginning this week, students and teachers are invited to submit essays explaining their reasons for wanting to go to Africa and articulating what makes them ideally suited for such an experience. Any student 18 or older who is attending an American college, university, or graduate school, and any teacher currently working in a middle or high school in the United States, is eligible. Essays must be limited to 700 words and must be received along with application forms by April 6. Information about the competition is available at http://www.myspace.com/winatrip and http://www.nytimes.com/winatrip.

The two winners will be chosen by Kristof and announced in late April. The trip, which will last one to two weeks, is planned for the latter part of June. Video and other content from the trip will be available on both MySpace and The New York Times’ website.

Due in part to the volatile politics in the region, the schedule for the trip is still being formed, but likely countries for Kristof and his traveling companions to visit include Rwanda, Burundi, and Congo. Award-winning multi-media producer Naka Nathaniel, who traveled with Mr. Kristof last year to produce video segments, will again take part in the trip and help the other participants create presentations to be filed by satellite phone.

Also beginning on March 13, subscriptions to TimesSelect will be available for free to all registered college students and faculty with a .edu in their e-mail addresses. TimesSelect is NYTimes.com’s paid offering, providing exclusive access to 22 columnists of The Times and the International Herald Tribune as well as an array of other services, including access to The Times’s archives, advance previews of various sections and tools for tracking and storing news and information. Current student subscribers will receive pro-rated refunds for their previously paid subscriptions. College students interested in registering for free TimesSelect subscriptions should go to http://www.nytimes.com/university for more information.

We wanted to alert you to an exciting new international media program…

For three weeks next summer, from July 29-August 18, 2007, 60 journalism students from top universities all over the world will have the opportunity to study global media and global issues in Salzburg, Austria. The prestigious Salzburg Seminar is for the first time
opening its programming to international graduate students and only a
few US schools have been invited to participate.

“The Salzburg Academy Program for Media and Global Change” will have students attending from universities in Asia, the Middle East, Europe and the UK, South America and Africa. The faculty will come from the partnering institutions; among those scheduled to participate are Xiguang Li, the dean of Tsinghua University’s school of journalism, and
Stephen Jukes, the dean of Bournemouth University’s school of journalism (and the former foreign editor of Reuters).

This promises to be a dynamic program–its intent is to investigate the roles national and international media play in shaping global events and public policy. Students will jointly work on projects that will compare and evaluate media coverage of issues such as terrorism and climate change–student reporting will live on a dedicated Salzburg
Seminar website that will remain up, live and active after the end of the summer program.

The International Center for Media and Public Affairs (ICMPA) at the University of Maryland will be acting as the gateway for students attending American schools. You can access information about the Salzburg Academy program and the courses that will be offered, as well as an application at this site:
http://www.icmpa.umd.edu/pages/Salzburg_Academy.htm

If you would like to learn more about Schloss Leopoldskron, the 18th century palace where students will live, eat and study–the Schloss was also the location used as the von Trapp family home in “The Sound of Music”– you could go to the palace’s site:
http://www.schloss-leopoldskron.com/ (to read the site in English,
click on the language toggle on the top right of the page).

If you have questions please contact Prof. Susan Moeller (smoeller@umd.edu) who is the ICMPA director and the point person at Maryland for the program.

Dear students and faculty:

If you are interested in receiving news about UN programmes related
to tolerance, genocide and Holocaust, please send your name and
e-mail address to UNchronicle[at]un.org with a copy to holocaustremembrance[at]un.org. Please tell them about your J-school connection.

From one of our recent grads…

From: Ken Kostel

Sree:

Feel free to circulate if you haven’t already. Last year, a j-school student applied for and received one of these grants. It helped her travel to Kenya and report her master’s project
(which I believe won an award as one of the best projects at the end of the year).

Hope all’s well,
Ken Kostel
Senior Science Writer
The Earth Institute at Columbia University
—–Original Message—–
From: Columbia U. School of Int’l & Public Affairs
Sent: Wednesday, September 13, 2006 11:41 AM
Subject: Earth Institute Student Travel Grant Application

Dear Ken,

In response to requests to support student projects, a travel grant program was initiated last year by the Earth Institute. For the 2006-2007 Academic Year, funding has been allocated by the Earth Institute to support travel by students matriculated in Columbia University degree programs engaged in research projects dealing with issues of sustainable development and/or environmental protection. This travel is for projects directly related to degree studies at Columbia University.

The maximum travel grant award is $750 per person. Students awarded a grant must use this to cover the cost of their travel for research they are conducting to meet specific degree requirements. The travel grant program funds individuals rather than projects. In so doing, each member of a research team may apply individually for funding and there is no
limit on the number of people who may apply from any one project group. The final deadline for submitting an application is Friday, September 29, 2006.

Requirements:
In order to be considered for funding, students must follow the
application instructions, adhere to deadlines and be full time students
at Columbia University in good academic standing. Projects must be
related to sustainable development and environmental issues and must
have a faculty academic advisor who is an instructor of record for the
project. The project must be part of a course that awards academic
credit or is a degree requirement. For example, travel can be for
projects that are needed to complete studios, workshops, theses, senior
seminar projects, independent studies and other degree requirements.

Please find below an outline of application procedures and criterion
that will be reviewed when considering an application for a travel
award.

Application Instructions:
Students must complete the application form and submit a cover letter,
resume and project description. Only students who are in good academic
standing and have a faculty member willing to endorse their research and
application will be considered. Please note that applications will be
reviewed based upon the relationship of the travel to specific pedagogic
objectives of the research.

Please ensure you submit all forms together in a single envelope or
email. Hard copy applications should be submitted to the Office of
Education Programs located in room 1408 of the International Affairs
Building (420 West 118th Street, New York, NY 10027). Applications
submitted after the deadline will not be considered. Electronic
applications should be emailed to students@ei.columbia.edu

Submission Checklist:

1.Complete Application form

a.Review the travel information and country specific travel
warnings
b.Review the health and insurance information

2.Signature of Academic Advisor

3.Resume

4.Project Description

Pre-departure meetings:
Successful applicants will need to attend pre-departure meetings that
will be held by the Earth Institute to ensure that students are prepared
for their travel according to the University’s guidelines. Students must
ensure they have read the travel advisory and have followed the travel
instructions as stated in the award letter. Awardees will also be
required to ensure that they have ample health insurance and travel
insurance that covers MEDIVAC in the event that they need it.

Application for Earth Institute Travel Grant

Name:

Telephone #:____________________________E-mail Address:_______________
Degree Program/Year:

Academic Advisor: Name

Signature of
Advisor_________________________________________________________

Project Title:

Project Members (please list all members of your group):

Project Description (Please attach a one page project description:

Proposed Travel Itinerary

Purpose of Travel:

Travel Budget:

CPJ has kindly set aside two seats for J-school students for this event. If you would like to attend, you MUST follow the instructions at the bottom. There is a chance they will be able to accommodate one or two more people closer to the event.

CPJ Luncheon: The Crackdown on the Private Press in Ethiopia

Following antigovernment protests last November, the Ethiopian government blocked most private newspapers from publishing; raided newspaper offices, confiscating computers, documents and other materials; expelled two foreign journalists; and issued a “wanted list” of editors, writers, and dissidents. Fourteen journalists were arrested and charged with genocide and treason, offenses punishable by death. Two more are in jail after being convicted of “press offenses” under Ethiopia’s restrictive media law.

On March 3, CPJ Africa Program Coordinator Julia Crawford, Nairobi-based editor Charles Onyango-Obbo, and CPJ Board Member Charlayne Hunter-Gault traveled to Addis Ababa to pressure authorities to release Ethiopian journalists jailed in the massive crackdown. The CPJ delegation met with Ethiopian journalists, lawyers, diplomats, and top government officials, including Prime Minister Meles Zenawi. CPJ was also allowed to visit Kality Prison, on the outskirts of the capital, where dozens of opposition leaders and at least 14 journalists are being held. The delegation spoke for close to an hour with several of the imprisoned journalists, all of whom professed their innocence.

CPJ is pleased to host a luncheon with Julia Crawford to discuss CPJ’s work in Ethiopia. Advance copies of a special report on the delegation’s findings will be available.

Friday, April 28
12:30-2 PM (light lunch served)
CPJ offices
330 Seventh Avenue (b/w 28th and 29th streets)
11th Floor

Below is a link to some of our recent work on Ethiopia:
http://www.cpj.org/regions_06/africa_06/africa_06.html#ethiopia

TO RSVP, please follow these instructions carefully:

If you haven’t registered on this site earlier, follow these instructions to post a comment - in this case, your interest in attending. If you have already registered, just go ahead and log in and indicate your interest, using your full name and Columbia e-mail address.

* To register for this blog (you only have to do this once for all future comments), go to http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.

* Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and Columbia e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “N/A” in the URL section if you don’t have a site.
Your name WILL NOT show up there immediately, but will be there when we approve the comment within a few hours.

If more than two people RSVP, those three and higher will form the wait list for any dropouts. There may also be more seats available closer to the event.
Confirmations will be e-mailed to those who will be attending by the day before the event.

Cheers, Deans Sreenivasan & Huff

See below for a terrific opportunity. Many thanks to Prof. Kent for offering this course, which covers many topics we don’t usually get to cover during the academic year. You have to attend BOTH sessions (the first at Columbia, the second at the AP) in order to participate. Please see instructions below. Only 20 slots are available, first come, first served.

The Modern Newsroom: How It Works… And How to Survive In It
A two-session mini-course led by TOM KENT, deputy managing editor, The Associated Press - and adjunct professor at Columbia J-school.

A special two-class session on how modern newsrooms are organized and how to work most effectively in them. The first session, at Columbia, focuses on how to make the most of your first assignments, managing your time, accomplishing your biggest goals and avoiding some common stumbles. Since you’ll be a boss one day, the course also covers some effective techniques for leadership.

The second session, at the multimedia headquarters of The Associated Press in Manhattan, is a guide to organization of modern newsrooms: breaking down the walls that hinder coordination and multimedia production, the special writing demands of the Web and new ways of carving up work and assignments.

Any student this May is welcome to sign up (all concentrations welcome).

The sessions (you have to attend both) are:
Tuesday, April 25, 7-9 pm at the J-school - room 607a
Tuesday, May 9, 6-8 pm at the AP.
Sign-up info below.

Tom Kent bio: B.A., Yale. With The Associated Press: newsman in Hartford (Conn.), New York, Sydney (Australia) and Moscow; NATO and European Community correspondent, Brussels; chief of operations in Tehran; chief of bureau, Moscow; deputy World Service editor; World Service editor; international editor; deputy managing editor; adjunct professor, Harriman Institute, SIPA; juror, Pulitzer Prizes.

To sign up, please follow these instructions carefully.

If you haven’t registered on this site earlier, follow these instructions to post a comment - in this case, your interest in attending. If you have already registered, just go ahead and log in and indicate your interest, using your full name and Columbia e-mail address.

* To register for this blog (you only have to do this once for all future comments), go to http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.

* Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and Columbia e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “N/A” in the URL section if you don’t have a site.

* Please write in that you are able to attend BOTH Kent sessions.

Your name WILL NOT show up there immediately, but will be there when we approve the comment within a few hours.

If more than 20 people RSVP, those 21 and higher will form the wait list for any dropouts. Confirmations will be e-mailed to those who will be attending by the day before the event.

Cheers, Deans Sreenivasan & Huff

Dear Students:

The latest in the series of Publisher’s Roundtables Dean Lemann is hosting (at each event, he will host a lunch for a major publisher and 15 students - current J-school M.S., M.A. and PhD students) is below.

We have seats available at the following Roundtable - first come, first served. RSVP required.

Wednesday, April 19, noon-1:15 pm
Boxed lunch will be served.

Mort Zuckerman, chairman and co-publisher of the New York Daily News; editor-in-chief and publisher of US News & World Report.

Please follow these instructions carefully:

If you haven’t registered on this site earlier, follow these instructions to post a comment - in this case, your interest in attending. If you have already registered, just go ahead and log in and indicate your interest, using your full name and Columbia e-mail address.

* To register for this blog (you only have to do this once for all future comments), go to http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.

* Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and Columbia e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “N/A” in the URL section if you don’t have a site.
Your name WILL NOT show up there immediately, but will be there when we approve the comment within a few hours.

Please do NOT sign up if you have already attended one of the previous Roundtables.

If more than 15 people RSVP, those 16 and higher will form the wait list for any dropouts. Confirmations will be e-mailed to those who will be attending by the day before the event.

Cheers, Deans Sreenivasan & Huff

Poseidon and Athena tell of the fall of the Trojan regime, informing us that tough decisions will have to be made in its wake. Journalist Talthybius follows the fate of the vanquished, using Geraldo-style tactics to land exclusive interviews with Helen and Andromache. Poseidon leads a political roundtable in the style of Charlie Rose. You are the studio audience, called upon to determine the fate of the vanquished.

Through a unique presentation, drawn almost entirely from the original Euripides text, this unconventional Trojan Women shows how the decline of objective, non-participatory press affects our collective awareness of suffering.

Discount Tickets to The Trojan Women! Columbia Journalism School students are entitled to $8 tickets for the first two weeks of the show! See The Trojan Women March 16, 17,18, 23, 24, or 25, 2006. Purchase tickets in advance at Ticket Central using promotional code JSCH.

The Trojan Women plays from March 15 through April 1 at The TADA! Theater (15 West 28th Street; between Broadway and 5th). Show times are Thursday through Saturday nights at 8pm, with additional matinees on Saturdays at 3pm. Opening night is Wednesday, March 15 at 8pm.
Tickets are $15.00 for general admission, $10.00 for students and seniors, and they can be purchased by calling 212-279-4200 or visiting TicketCentral.com . Call 718-398-2494 for more information. This presentation is not a TADA! production

Dear Students:

Dean Lemann is hosting a series of Publisher’s Roundtables during the spring semester. At each event, he will host a lunch for a major publisher and 15 students (current J-school M.S., M.A. and PhD students only) .

We have seats available at the following Roundtable - first come, first served; see details below.

Wednesday, March 8, noon-1:15 pm
Boxed lunch will be served.

Markos Kounalakis, president and publisher of The Washington Monthly.
See bio.

Please follow these instructions carefully:

If you haven’t registered on this site earlier, follow these instructions to post a comment - in this case, your interest in attending. If you have already registered, just go ahead and log in and indicate your interest, using your full name and Columbia e-mail address.

* To register for this blog (you only have to do this once for all future comments), go to http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.

* Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and Columbia e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “N/A” in the URL section if you don’t have a site.
Your name WILL NOT show up there immediately, but will be there when we approve the comment within a few hours.

Please do NOT sign up if you have already attended one of the previous Roundtables.

If more than 15 people RSVP, those 16 and higher will form the wait list for any dropouts. Confirmations will be e-mailed to those who will be attending by the day before the event.

Cheers, Deans Sreenivasan & Huff

[UPDATE, 2/15/2006: Note we now have 15 seats. Even if you can’t attend this event, it’s a good idea to register for this website, so you can quickly RSVP to future events. Instructions below]

Dear Students:

Dean Lemann is hosting a series of Publisher’s Roundtables during the spring semester. At each event, he will host a lunch for a major publisher and 12 15! students.

We have seats available at the following Roundtable - first come, first served; see details below.

Wednesday, Feb. 22, noon-1:30 pm
Boxed lunch will be served.

David G. Bradley, Chairman, The Atlantic
See NYO piece on Bradley’s search for a top editor.

Please follow these instructions carefully:

If you haven’t registered on this site earlier, follow these instructions to post a comment - in this case, your interest in attending. If you have already registered, just go ahead and log in and indicate your interest, using your full name and Columbia e-mail address.

* To register for this blog (you only have to do this once for all future comments), go to http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.

* Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and Columbia e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “N/A” in the URL section if you don’t have a site.
Your name WILL NOT show up there immediately, but will be there when we approve the comment within a few hours.

Please do NOT sign up if you have already attended one of the previous Roundtables.

If more than 12 15 people RSVP, those 16 and higher will form the wait list for any dropouts.

Cheers, Deans Sreenivasan & Huff

From Ann Elizabeth Törnkvist, aet2110

Dear fellow J-schoolers.

At the beginning-of-term all class lecture, I mentioned a volleyball team and a soccer team for the university’s intramural team. Francesco Radicati, fr2148, will be looking into the soccer
intramural.

I, on the other hand, would like to organise a volleyball team. We have to be signed up by the end of January, so if you are at all interested, please email me now so I can add your names to the
list, because they won’t let non-listed players play in the games after a certain point. So even if you aren’t a hundred per cent sure you want to play, send me an email in any case.

In terms of practice, I’m also the new captain of the Columbia Club team, but as there is a varsity team we usually are only 7-10 people at practice, so women at J-school, consider yourself invited
to our practice sessions, Mondays 10.30 pm to midnight, and Thursdays same hours.

Any question, my telephone number is 917-346-8854.

Cheers
Ann Elizabeth Törnkvist
Columbia Graduate School of Journalism

NOTE: 20 seats (previously only 10) have been set aside for Columbia J-school students. If you’d like to attend, please follow these instructions.
1. Register for this blog at http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.
2. Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “http://” in the URL section if you don’t have a site. Your name WILL NOT show up there immediately, but will be there when we approve the comment. The first 20 names will be sent directly to the event organizers. Rest will be placed on a waiting list. Check the list a few days before the event.

Once you have registered for this blog, you can use the same login for future events. Meanwhile, please remember to sign up only if you are able to attend - we had problems last semester and so had to write a memo about it. We don’t like writing memos.

The Century Foundation cordially invites you to attend a panel discussion by leading journalists about media coverage of the Vietnam and Iraq Wars.

What: Bringing the War Home: American Media Coverage of Vietnam and Iraq
Forum Moderated by ABC’s Lynn Sheer with lunch to follow

Where: Harvard Hall, The Harvard Club
27 W. 44th Street, New York
When: January 19, 2006 from 11:30am to 1:30pm, with lunch to follow from 1:30pm to 2:30pm

Panelists Include: Morley Safer, CBS
Sydney Schanberg, Village Voice, author of The Death and Life of Dith Pran
Jane Arraf, CNN
Mark Whittaker, Newsweek
Deborah Amos, NPR
Peter Osnos, Public Affairs Books, formerly of The Washington Post

About the Forum: Forty years after the United States became a direct combatant in Vietnam, it is again embroiled in a distant war that deeply divides the American public and alienates much of the world. Both then and now, the American reporters and editors have found themselves at the center of a bitter debate about the responsibility of news media to the public at a time when security sensitivities are high, and how this tension should affect reporting of both decision-making in the capital and activities in the field.

The Century Foundation invites you to a discussion with leading journalists who covered the Vietnam and Iraq Wars that will explore the factors affecting media coverage in these times of crisis. In addition to addressing similarities in covering these two conflicts, panelists will discuss changes in coverage in a post-9/11world and implications of the changing news mediums, such as the rise of the 24-hour-news cycle, Internet-based news, and blogs. They will also consider what these factors may suggest about media coverage, policy transparency, and pressures from Washington, media ownership, and the public in the years ahead.

A note from Brandon Keim, M.A. 2006 and M.S. 2005, brandon[at]earthlab.net

Hello out there,

Last week there was some emailing among 2005 alumni about Bob Woodward’s recent misconduct.? Afterwards it seemed we needed a place to talk shop without adding to
everyone’s unsolicited email flood, so I set up a list for us. Everyone, of course, is invited. To join, go to http://groups.google.com/group/CSofJ

and sign up. Then feel free to post whatever interests you — questions, observations, good journalism, dilemmas — and hopefully some wisdom will come out of this.

Dean Sree asked me how this is different from TheTenMonthBeat… TheTenMonthBeat is more an event & logistics source — it’s not a place where someone would go and say, “Did you hear about what Bob Woodward did?? What do you think?” or “I was reading this article and trying to figure out how they sourced this part — little help?” or
“I’ve got this source who wants to be identified as such and such — what should I do?” and then have some community discussion about it. Hopefully the seed will sprout into a network whose dialogue helps us be better journalists.

The New York Times invites J-school students and faculty to…

What’s the Future of the Supreme Court?,
presented as a part of TimesTalks, the New York Times Speaker Series

Tuesday, November 15
6:30 - 8 p.m.
The Kaye Playhouse, Hunter College
68th Street and Lexington Avenue

Participants:
Martin Garbus, trial lawyer and partner, Davis & Gilbert
Suzanne Goldberg, associate professor and director, Women’s Rights
Litigation Clinic, Rutgers Law School
Anthony Lewis, former New York Times columnist and Pulitzer Prize-winning
journalist
Thomas Merrill, Charles Keller Beekman Professor of Law, Columbia Law
School

Moderator: Linda Greenhouse, Supreme Court correspondent, The New York Times

We hope you will be able to join us at Hunter College for this important
and timely discussion.

Advance RSVPs are strictly required for this complimentary invitation.

Kindly respond no later than Monday, November 14 to Jennifer Pauly via
e-mail to paulyj [at] nytimes.com. Please identify yourself as a Columbia Journalism School student or faculty member and provide your name so that we can add you to our guest list.

UPDATE (10/21/05 at 7 p.m.): These five tickets are gone, but we are keeping a waiting list.

First five students to write to sree@sree.net with “Corprate crimes panel” in the subject line can have these tix. First come, first served. Only those who make the cut will be contacted.

Columbia Business School Alumni Club of New York
in cooperation with SAJA
presents
A Panel Discussion on:
“Challenges faced by Media in covering White-Collar Crime and Impact
of Corporate Scandals on American Economy”
Panelists
Bethany McLean, FORTUNE
Charles Gasparino, NEWSWEEK
Liz Claman, CNBC
Chris Byron, NEW YORK POST
Nelson Boxer, ALSTON & BIRD
Moderator: Sanjay Sanghoee - author of MERGER, a Financial
Thriller - http://www.merger-novel.com

Wed, October 26, 2005
6:30 - 9:30 PM
VENUE: The Warwick Hotel New York, 65 West 54th Street (on Ave. of
the Americas)
COST: SAJA Members: $15 (special rate - must register with Sanjay directly)
Columbia Alumni Club Members: $25
Non-Members: $35

NOTE: 20 FREE PASSES AVAILABLE FOR WORKING PRESS ONLY

FOR MORE INFORMATION/TO REGISTER, PLEASE CONTACT SANJAY AT
SANJAY9000@YAHOO.COM

Limited passes available for this. Let Dean Sreenivasan know if you’d like to attend ASAP. E-mail sree@sree.net, subject line = “Reuters event.” Only those who make the cut will be informed.

Reuters and VNU invite you to join a panel of experts to discuss the state of relations between celebrities and the media, and explore the impact this is having on the nation’s news agenda.

Thursday October 20th 2005
6.00pm - 8.30pm
(panel discussion to commence at 6.15pm)
The Reuters Building,
3 Times Square, 30th Floor, New York NY 10036

STRICTLY INVITATION ONLY

The event is the third in this year’s series of Reuters Newsmakers events held in its US headquarters in 3 Times Square.
The Issues

* Has the relationship soured and who is to blame?
* When is a celebrity’s private life a matter of public interest?
* Who is really feeding off whom?
* Do celebrities deserve to have their privacy protected or does their courting of the media for publicity make them fair game?
* Is the coverage of personalities driven by news values or dollars?

The Panel
Paul Holmes Moderator, Global Editor, General and Political News, Reuters
Janice Min Editor, US Weekly
Jessica Coen Editor, Gawker
Anne Thompson Deputy Film Editor, The Hollywood Reporter
Michael Wolff Columnist, Vanity Fair
Ken Sunshine Ken Sunshine Consultants, Celebrity Publicist
More panelists to be confirmed.

Reuters Newsmaker Events offer us an opportunity to share our position at the heart of the news industry with you. We would be delighted if you could join us for this event.

Places are limited.

10/13/2005 UPDATE: I got a fresh batch of tickets this morning. E-mail me as per below if you’d like to claim one.

10/6/2005 UPDATE: The tickets below have already been claimed. We are going to give one ticket away, by lottery, at the BBLWD.

Original post:

We have a handful of tickets to the following event. If you are interested in one of these tickets, please e-mail your name, e-mail address and (cell)phone in a message to sree@sree.net with the following subject line = “Cronkite event” (no quotes). Messages are sorted automagically, so be sure to follow the instructions. First come, first served. Only those who make the cut will hear back from me.

Please sign up only if you can attend the morning session AND the lunch. And please sign up only if you are sure you can attend. Here’s the official description…

We are pleased to inform you that Walter Cronkite, this country’s most respected journalist, will be the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award given by the Freedom Broadcasting Foundation. We would like to extend an offer of complimentary tickets for you and 5 of your students to attend this significant event.
This award will be presented at a luncheon in mid-town at noon on Thurs., October 20th. Preceding the luncheon will be a panel discussion with distinguished leaders of the U.S. international broadcasting community, focusing on the critical importance of a free press in the post-communist world. The panel discussion will begin at 10:30 AM, followed by the lunch and presentation ceremonies at noon. The session will end promptly at 2:00 PM.

Please watch for an announcement tomorrow in your e-mail inbox from Irena Stern in the alumni office for free tickets being set aside for students for the J-school’s special screening of “Good Night and Good Luck” at Miller Theater and the discussion starring George Clooney and Dean Lemann.

As you know, just a handful of the panel discussions, speaker events, job interview sessions, etc., have limited seating and/or require advance signup. If we have a space constraint (or limited tickets, as with the New Yorker Festival tickets), signups are a way for us to reserve space for those who want to attend.

It has been brought to my attention that some students are not showing up for things they are signing up for. Of course, we understand that breaking news, student assignments from professors, etc., can force you to miss an appointment, especially for an outside event. That’s not what I am talking about. I am talking about students who sign up for job interviews, conference sessions, luncheon events, and don’t bother to show up - and don’t bother to inform the organizers in advance. In one particularly egregious case, half of the students who signed up for a very popular afternoon seminar last month didn’t attend. They not only made the school look bad, they also cost several other students the opportunity to attend instead.

Some quick thoughts on this:

• Please sign up only if you are sure you can attend. It’s tempting to sign up for everything you hear about.
• If you discover you can’t make it, please e-mail or call your contact as soon as you discover the conflict. We usually have long waiting lists.
• The various people who program events here are now keeping “no show lists” - names of students who sign up, don’t show and don’t tell us. If your name ends up on this list, your will be moved automatically to waiting lists for events.

  Thanks for your cooperation.

  - Dean Sreenivasan

Dear Students:

Dean Lemann has kindly offered students some comp. tix to the following three
sold-out events at this weekend’s New Yorker Festival - see below.

If you are interested in any of these, please e-mail ss221@columbia.edu
with your name, e-mail and best tel. number. Please see subject line
instructions below. These will be sorted automagically, so messages that
do not follow the instructions will be deleted. If you are interested in
more than one - or aren’t picky about which you attend - no problem, but
separate messages are required for each.

First come, first served. Those who make the cut will be informed by Thursday
evening. No other communication will be forthcoming on this. Please sign up
ONLY IF YOU CAN ATTEND.

More on the festival at http://festival.newyorker.com

Advocacy Journalism [sold out]
Reporting on what you care about.
Nicholas Lemann, moderator. With Christiane Amanpour, Jon Lee Anderson,
Katherine Boo, and Rich Lowry.
SATURDAY at 10 A.M. Florence Gould Hall
French Institute Alliance Française ($25)

Subject line must read: “Advocacy” - no quotes.

- - -

Cartoonists Unleashed: A Variety Show [sold out]
Pat Byrnes, Leo Cullum, Matthew Diffee, Mort Gerberg, Alex Gregory, Marshall
Hopkins, Edward Koren, Arnie Levin, Eric Lewis, Robert Mankoff, Marissa
Acocella Marchetto, Victoria Roberts, Danny Shanahan, David Sipress, Barbara
Smaller, Mick Stevens, Mike Twohy, Gahan Wilson, Jack Ziegler, and more.
Conceived by Matthew Diffee and hosted by Andy Borowitz.
SATURDAY at 10 P.M. Ailey Studios ($35)

Subject line must read: “Cartoonists” - no quotes.

- - -

Master Class in Fiction [sold out]
With Donald Antrim and Edward P. Jones
SUNDAY at 4 P.M. Conde Nast Auditorium ($35)

Subject line must read: “Fiction” - no quotes.

-30-

THIS EVENT IS NOW CLOSED AND SOLD OUT. WATCH FOR FUTURE EVENTS.

We have five seats from our friends at the Council on Foreign Relations. These events are typically only for working press, but they are opening up the seats for a few Columbia J-school folks.

COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
*New York On-The-Record Meeting*

A Conversation with Romano Prodi

Speaker:
ROMANO PRODI
Prime Minister, Italy

Presider:
RICHARD N. GARDNER
Senior Counsel, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP; U.S. Ambassador to Italy, 1977-81

Date: Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Camera Set-Up Time: 7:00 - 7:30 a.m.

Press Registration: 7:30 - 7:45 a.m.

Meeting Time: 7:45 - 8:45 a.m.

Location: Council on Foreign Relations
58 East 68th Street New York, NY 10021

Open to Council members and accredited journalists only.
Business attire is required.
Please arrive on time and stay for the duration of the meeting.

TO SIGN UP: Please follow these instructions carefully…

If you haven’t registered on this site earlier, follow these instructions to post a comment - in this case, your interest in attending. If you have already registered, just go ahead and log in and indicate your interest, using your full name and Columbia e-mail address.

* To register for this blog (you only have to do this once for all future comments), go to http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.

* Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and Columbia e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “N/A” in the URL section if you don’t have a site.
Your name WILL NOT show up there immediately, but will be there when we approve the comment within a few hours.

Please put your full name in the “Your comment” section - also indicate if you are willing to write a “Notes From…” for this event (we will confirm with you about that)

If more than five people RSVP, those six and higher will form the wait list for any dropouts. If you are among the first five, you are confirmed. If you are on the waitlist and spot opens up, we will let you know. We may also have extra tickets coming up. We will send a final confirmation note to all attendees the day before.

PLEASE NOTE: If you sign up and do not attend (and do not let us know at least two days in advance), you will not be able to avail of any such offers in the future.

Cheers, Deans Sreenivasan & Huff

We have five seats from our friends at the Council on Foreign Relations. These events are typically only for working press, but they are opening up the seats for Columbia J-school folks.

COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
*New York On-The-Record Meeting*

Religion and Foreign Policy Series
Faith and Politics

Speaker:
SENATOR JOHN C. DANFORTH
Author, Faith and Politics: How the “Moral Values” Debate Divides America and How to Move Forward Together

Presider:
JON MEACHAM
Managing Editor, Newsweek

* For more information on the Council’s Religion and Foreign Policy Initiative, visit http://www.cfr.org/about/washington/religion.html

Date: Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Reception and Book Signing: 12:00 - 12:30 p.m.
Press Registration and Lunch: 12:30 - 1:00 p.m.
Meeting Time: 1:00 - 2:00 p.m.
Location: Council on Foreign Relations
58 East 68th Street New York, NY 10021

**RSVP REQUIRED**
Open to Council members and accredited journalists only.
Business attire is required.
Please arrive on time and stay for the duration of the meeting.

TO SIGN UP: Please follow these instructions carefully…

If you haven’t registered on this site earlier, follow these instructions to post a comment - in this case, your interest in attending. If you have already registered, just go ahead and log in and indicate your interest, using your full name and Columbia e-mail address.

* To register for this blog (you only have to do this once for all future comments), go to http://deanstudents.blogsome.com/wp-register.php (once you are registered - includes a password being sent to you via e-mail), go to step 2.

* Click on the “Comments” at the bottom of this post and fill in your FULL NAME - first and last - and Columbia e-mail address (just fill it in once, typing in just “N/A” in the URL section if you don’t have a site.
Your name WILL NOT show up there immediately, but will be there when we approve the comment within a few hours.

Please put your full name in the “Your comment” section - also indicate if you are willing to write a “Notes From…” for this event (we will confirm with you about that)

If more than five people RSVP, those six and higher will form the wait list for any dropouts. If you are among the first five, you are confirmed. If you are on the waitlist and spot opens up, we will let you know. We may also have extra tickets coming up.

PLEASE NOTE: If you sign up and do not attend (and do not let us know at least two days in advance), you will not be able to avail of any such offers in the future.

Cheers, Deans Sreenivasan & Huff