Hello, fellow J-School alums!
We hope you’ve had a good summer. We’re starting this newsletter with a message from the new dean, Michael D. Bolden, who begins his tenure at UC Berkeley Journalism at a challenging moment for both academia and our profession. You’ll also find details about activities for Homecoming 2025 and other fall events, plus two great alumni volunteer opportunities. And don’t miss our “Five Questions” feature, this time with Pulitzer Prize finalist Susie Neilson (’19).
___________________________________________________________________________
A Note from Dean Michael D. Bolden
Dear Berkeley Journalism alums:
Being dean of UC Berkeley Journalism is the most meaningful role of my journalism career, especially at this moment when the free press and democracy itself are under threat.
As I arrived in Berkeley, Congress was cutting more than $1 billion already allocated to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Now, CPB is shutting down and NPR and hundreds of PBS stations are scrambling to find new sources of funding to make up for what they are losing. This news came on the heels of the decimation of USAID and the U.S. Agency for Global Media and attacks on media around the world.
These cuts — as well as the undermining of our free press — directly affect our alumni community. We cannot sugarcoat what this means for our industry and the communities that we call home. Yet we know that we need more journalism, and more journalists, during this period of rapid technological disruption and burgeoning population growth.
In the face of such dynamic change, we must build upon our successes. Even as the federal government cut funding for journalism, California approved $15 million to expand our California Local News Fellowship and provide more training for the journalists who participate with the support of the Maynard Institute for Journalism Education, California Black Media, the Latino Media Collaborative and American Community Media. As the federal government restricts freedom of information, our Investigative Reporting Program has worked with colleagues at Berkeley and nationwide to launch a database on police misconduct and use of force. This spirit of collaboration is essential to journalism’s future.
Our success as a school is tied to your success, wherever your path has taken you. Whether you’re reporting, managing, advocating or applying your training in new ways, you carry your J-School experience into newsrooms, communities and organizations around the world. To continue to succeed as one of the great journalism schools in the world, we must serve and celebrate you — and I invite you to be an active part of the work we do. I am open to your insights and your ideas. And I look forward to your partnership.
Michael D. Bolden
Dean, UC Berkeley Journalism
______________________________________________________________________________
Rally to Support Public Media
Dozens of Berkeley Journalism alums work in public media across the country. To name just a few: Sukey Lewis (’15), Jenny Brundin (’93), Erik Neumann (’14), Adam Raney (’05), Bria Suggs (’24), Gabriel Sanchez (’06), Shaina Shealy (’16), Tamara Keith (’01), Tyche Hendricks (’97), Rachael Myrow (’95), Cecilia Lei (’19), Pendarvis Harshaw (’14), Laura Klivans (’16), Eleni Gill Avendaño (’19) …
Carrie Lozano. Photo courtesy of ITVS.
These cuts are also dramatically impacting the documentary film world, as alum and Advisory Board member Carrie Lozano (’05), President & CEO of ITVS, the publicly funded documentary company behind hundreds of titles from Oscar nominees to festival favorites recently wrote in The Hollywood Reporter.
They and others are suddenly facing an existential crisis not seen in the 58 years since passage of the Public Broadcasting Act. On July 25, Congress and the Trump administration formally rescinded federal funding for public media, creating a financing shortfall that threatens member stations everywhere. According to Darren LaShelle, CEO of Sonoma County-based Northern California Public Media, “Services by national partners have been crippled … and we are in danger of losing several stations from the nationwide NPR and PBS networks.”
For NorCal Public Media, the loss of federal money amounts to two years of funding at $600,000 per year. “This threatens our efforts to deliver local news, educational media, and our capacity to keep our communities informed,” says LaShelle. For public radio or TV stations in rural areas, without the populations to sustain stations through memberships and donations, the loss of taxpayer funding is even more devastating.
While it’s too late to try to sway Congressional Republicans (you can see a roll call of the Senate vote here) from going along with the Trump administration’s policies, you can add your voice to “Protect My Public Media” and to the “American Coalition for Public Radio.” The effort is now to urge Congress to restore public media funding through next year’s appropriations process.
Do you work in public media? Will you share your story? Please contact Greta Mart (’15) at gretamart@icloud.com, as we’ll hear those stories in an upcoming edition of North Gate Update.
______________________________________________________________________________
Coming to Homecoming?
You should. There’s a lot going on this year!
Join us for a chance to reconnect, catch up and celebrate with fellow Berkeley Journalism alums. Whether you are still in the field, doing something new or post-career, come out to enjoy complimentary appetizers and beverages with your J-School community. All alums are welcome!
Friday, October 3
6:00 pm – 8:00 pm
North Gate Hall
RSVP here.
Join fellow alumni from ’99, ’00 and ’01 for a special reunion weekend filled with connection, nostalgia and plenty of fun. Whether you are near or far, we can’t wait to welcome you back! For more information about the weekend’s program, see the tentative schedule. Special thanks to Sara Needham (’00) and Zsuzsanna Geller-Varga (’00) for organizing this reunion weekend — don’t forget to RSVP!
October 3 – 5
Berkeley, California
RSVP here.
Don’t miss the chance to hear from our new dean, Michael D. Bolden, in conversation with Sara Catania (’94), president of the Solutions Journalism Network. Together, they’ll explore how solutions-focused reporting is reshaping journalism — building trust, inspiring civic engagement and connecting news more deeply to people’s lives.
Friday, October 3
4:00 pm – 5:00 pm
North Gate Hall
RSVP here.
Five Questions: Susie Neilson (’19)
Susie Neilson
Susie Neilson works on the San Francisco Chronicle’s investigative team. This year, she was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for national reporting for “Fast and Fatal,” a probe into deaths resulting from police car pursuits across the U.S. She tells Bonnie Eslinger (’98) about her favorite J-School memories, offers some good advice to journalists just launching their careers and discusses her latest investigation. Read the interview here: Five Questions for Susie Nielsen.
Bay Area Alumni Connect in San Francisco
About two dozen Bay Area alumni of Berkeley Journalism came together on June 25 at the Merchants Exchange Club in San Francisco for a gathering hosted by the San Francisco Examiner. It was a fun evening with people from at least a dozen different classes in attendance. It was the second Bay Area networking event organized by the BJVAAC. We hope to have another Bay Area gathering soon, likely in the East Bay. If you have thoughts about where we might get together, would like to help organize it, or have any other ideas to pass along, please get in touch. Find us at caljsalums@gmail.com.
Washington, D.C. Area Alums Gather at NPR
Our D.C. alums gathered at the offices of NPR in early July to connect with and welcome new UC Berkeley Journalism Dean Michael D. Bolden, who was just departing his post as head of the American Press Institute. Big thanks to Tamara Keith (’01) and Advisory Board member Ron Nixon for hosting and helping organize the event and to all the alums who braved DC thunderstorms to come out.
______________________________________________________________________________
Upcoming volunteer opportunities
Lead an Ethics Class Discussion
Help guide small-group discussions this fall with students in the J255 Ethics Class. You’ll sit in on the faculty lecture and then lead the follow-up discussion using prompts we provide and your own experience. You don’t need to be a subject matter expert, just a working journalist. For the list of topics covered in each class, see the class schedule.
Classes take place on Wednesdays from 2 to 5 p.m. from late October to early December. You’ll receive a $100 honorarium for every class discussion you help lead. Sign up here.
Mentor a Current Student
Each year, Berkeley Journalism students sign up for a chance to connect with mentors who can offer guidance and counsel on their classes, projects and career goals. J-School alums who are working (or retired) professionals can provide invaluable advice and insight to students who are now where they were a few years or even decades before. This minimal but rewarding commitment includes meeting at least once a month with a student over the course of the school year and helping shape their path forward. Your involvement helps ensure the continued success of Berkeley Journalism students when they graduate. Keep an eye out for details on how to sign up later this fall.
Looking for a job? Looking to hire?
Check out the J-School’s Journalism Jobs listserv. Recent postings include positions at the BBC, CEB Legal and The Broad Institute.
To view current jobs, visit Journalism Jobs.
(Tip: Job seekers need to join to get access, but it’s easy and quick.)
To list a job posting, just email the details to journalismjobs@lists.berkeley.edu.
Class Notes: News from Alums
Stephanie Beasley (’07), a senior writer at the Chronicle of Philanthropy, has been selected to co-chair this year’s annual conference for the Journalism and Women’s Symposium (JAWS) in Washington, D.C. JAWS provides training and support to working journalists, journalism educators and researchers across the country.
Rachel Lehmann-Haupt
Rachel Lehmann-Haupt (’99) has published two books, launched StoryMade Studio, a boutique editing and writing studio, and recently published the first chapter of her third book, “My Visit with My Dead Father’s Brain,” in Nautilus magazine.
Please get in touch to say hello: rachel@storymadestudio.com.
Got news, personal or professional, to share? Drop us an update here. We’d love to hear from you!
This email newsletter is sent to UC Berkeley Journalism alumni. For information on alumni programming at UC Berkeley Journalism, including events, volunteer opportunities and/or questions, please email Lia Swindle, Alumni Engagement, at lia.swindle@berkeley.edu.
