Berkeley J-School offers unparalleled post-graduate fellowships in investigative reporting

Where major news organizations have cut back, UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism and generous donors have stepped in. Our Investigative Reporting Program has hosted the nation’s leading post-graduate fellowships in investigative reporting since 2007. The one-of-a-kind program is open to all working journalists with preference given to J-School alums.

This year’s fellowships are made possible by a core grant from the Sandler Foundation, along with donations from Scott and Jennifer Fearon, Margaret and Will Hearst, Peter Wiley and Valerie Barth, and the Financial Times. The 2014-15 IRP fellowships are funding the work of journalists Anabel Hernandez, Steve Fisher, Sierra Crane-Murdoch and David Montero.

The fellowships provide a year’s salary of $56,000 and $10,000 in reporting and travel expenses to journalists who are reporting on complex stories in the public interest. The IRP provides logistical support and editorial guidance, and and helps to get widespread exposure for finished stories.

The fellowship program has helped launch the careers of several investigative reporters. Jonathan Jones (’05) used his 2008-09 fellowship to investigate Firestone Tire and Rubber Co.’s history in Liberia. The story became the basis of a documentary with PBS Frontline and ProPublica, which aired on PBS in November 2014. IRP fellows’ work has also appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Newsweek, NPR, the PBS NewsHour, The Wall Street Journal, The Nation, National Geographic, Wired and other outlets.

The IRP fellowships are the brainchild of Lowell Bergman, the J-School’s Reva and David Logan Distinguished Chair in Investigative Journalism and for many years overseen by investigative reporter Marlena Telvick.

“It was my dream as a young reporter passionate about a particular investigation or story to be able to do it without worrying about getting paid, or being able to cover story-related expenses,” Bergman says. “There are no other fellowships like the IRP’s — an ongoing program that involves students with producing work for publication and broadcast.”

In addition to reporting their own investigative stories, IRP fellows mentor graduate students at the J-School and undergraduates working at the student-run newspaper, The Daily Cal. Students are regularly recruited to work on fellows’ projects, conducting research and fact-checking.

Three former IRP fellows are now staff members of the IRP: 2010-11 fellow Tim McGirk is the IRP’s managing editor and 2009-10 fellows Matt Isaacs and Zachary Stauffer have stayed on as senior reporter/lecturer and producer/lecturer, respectively.