Jeremy C.F. Lin completes prestigious Google Journalism Fellowship

Jeremy C.F. Lin, a second-year student at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, was among 11 students selected from nearly 1,400 applicants nationwide for this year’s Google Journalism Fellowship. The program, now in its third year, offers fellows the opportunity to spend the summer working at a news organization that uses technology to tell stories in new and innovative ways.

Lin worked with the Texas Tribune, an award-winning digital-first news organization that seeks to inform and engage with Texans on public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.

“It was a great ride working with the Texas Tribune News Apps team,” Lin said. “I was able to work on things I loved: data visualizations, design and data journalism. I also had a chance to challenge myself with new tools and new coding languages.” Lin’s work this summer covered everything from quick embedded charts, illustrations and graphics to explorers diving into healthcare data, campus crime rates and energy production.

“Lin is a paragon of the type of new student we are seeing pursuing graduate education in journalism,” said J-School New Media Lecturer Jeremy Rue. “This industry desperately needs more people who can bridge the worlds of technological innovation and journalism, and who devote their work in service to the public interest. Lin helps to fill that void."

Lin will continue to focus on data visualization, front-end web development and online news package production during his second year at the J-School. “I aspire to be a visual journalist capable of telling stories in diverse, innovative formats,” he said, “as a means for bringing a story’s evidence to life and compelling readers to consider it for themselves.”

At the end of the fellowship, Lin wrote a Tribune blog post about the experience here.

The 10-week Google Journalism Fellowship awarded each winner an $8,000 stipend and began with a weeklong orientation at Google headquarters in Mountain View, Calif., followed by nine weeks working at the fellow’s host organization. This is the second consecutive year a Berkeley student has been awarded this fellowship. Last year’s winner, Jessica Hamel (’14), also performed her fellowship at the Texas Tribune.

More information on the program and host organizations can be found at the Google Journalism Fellowship website.