What is the Committee of Concerned Journalists?

What does the Committee of Concerned Journalists do?

Who belongs to CCJ?

How is CCJ funded?

Do you provide grants to journalists?

What is the Traveling Curriculum?

What is the source of Traveling Curriculum workshop content?

What can I expect the Traveling Curriculum training to accomplish in my newsroom?

What makes the Traveling Curriculum unique from other types of training we could bring to our newsroom?

Is CCJ training expensive? How much does it cost?

Who are the workshop facilitators?

What are the steps involved in setting up a workshop?

How much preparation time is involved between inquiring about a workshop and the workshop taking place?

Is any post-workshop follow-up provided by CCJ?

How can I attend CCJ training?

Does CCJ have a training program for citizens?

I want to participate in CCJ’s training program but can’t get my newsroom manager to bite on the idea. Is there still a way for me to participate on my own?

I’m a journalist but I don’t work in a traditional print or broadcast newsroom setting. Will CCJ still train my organization?

Does CCJ train outside the U.S.?

What is the Committee of Concerned Journalists?

The Committee of Concerned Journalists is a consortium of reporters, editors, producers, publishers, owners and academics from across media worried about the future of the profession. Chaired by Bill Kovach, it was formed in 1997 after a meeting at Harvard attended by leading figures in journalism. The participants included such diverse members of the profession as author David Halberstam, PBS correspondent Gwen Ifill, newspaper editor John Carroll and educator Jim Carey. The group is dedicated to the idea that, in order for journalism to survive, journalists themselves must be clearer, more rigorous and more vocal about the principles that set their profession apart and make their jobs matter.

[top]

What does the Committee of Concerned Journalists do?

After its inception in 1997, CCJ issued a statement of concern, created a network of professionals nationwide, held twenty-one forums, and conducted surveys and content studies to identify the core principles journalists share. These were then distilled in 2001 into a book, The Elements of Journalism: What Newspeople Should Know and the Public Should Expect. In turn, these ideas are available to news people through our Traveling Curriculum of workshops. The work continues through further research, reporting, writing and discussion.

[top]

Who belongs to CCJ?

Over 7,000 people – including reporters, writers, editors, producers, educators, students, and interested citizens – have joined the Committee of Concerned Journalists. Click here to join.

[top]

How is CCJ funded?

CCJ operates on a $2.8 million grant from The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

We are an affiliate of the new Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouri School of Journalism.

[top]

Do you provide grants to journalists?

No. CCJ is a grantee, not a grantor. We have received funding, and we sometimes hire journalists and researchers for specific projects, but we do not have resources set aside for people looking for funding.

[top]

What is the Traveling Curriculum?

The Traveling Curriculum is a CCJ training program for journalists and news organizations of all types. The workshops are designed to help organizations to identify their goals and to test whether their reflexes and methods are living up to those goals. News organizations pick from a growing menu of "modules" and custom design a training program to meet their objectives. Modules focus on a range of topics-from testing the discipline a news organization uses to verify the news to examining the techniques they use to make the news interesting. Based on studying what kind of training works in other fields, and developed with educational experts at Stanford, the curriculum relies heavily on Socratic method, case studies, small group exercises and large-group discussion. Lecture is limited. Begun in 2001, the CCJ Traveling Curriculum has reached thousands of journalists around the country and the world in a short time.

[top]

What is the source of Traveling Curriculum workshop content?

The Traveling Curriculum is based on three years of input and thoughts about the core principles of journalism gathered from journalists around the country through a series of forums CCJ founders Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel coordinated. These substance of these forum discussions also formed the basis of Kovach and Rosenstiel’s book , The Elements of Journalism: What Newspeople Should Know and the Public Should Expect.

Kovach and Rosenstiel worked with a team of behavioral psychologists and educators to translate the substance of the forum discussions into a coherent training curriculum. Today, the content of our training modules has evolved based on our experiences training in newsrooms and in response to the changing concerns of the journalism community.

Each session is then further adapted to the individual needs of the host news organization.

Through a series of conversations we will determine the topics that you would like addressed during our time with your organization. We will also discuss who might attend and any special needs to consider. When all is said and done, the workshop that we conduct will be unique and customized for your group.

[top]

What can I expect the Traveling Curriculum training to accomplish in my newsroom?

CCJ recently completed an intensive three-year “assessment” of its training program. The aim of this assessment was to determine what, if any, impacts the training was having on the newsrooms and individuals who’ve received training in the past. The assessment team collected a vast amount of data outlining participants’ reactions to the training through interviews with former workshop participants, pre and post-training staff surveys, and analysis of pre and post-training newsroom product.

The assessment found that individuals who participated in CCJ Traveling Curriculum workshops: reported strong and positive impacts on their sense of purpose and morale, reported increases in critical thinking about their work, demonstrated improvements in the quality of their news product, used CCJ-encouraged journalism tools in their work, communicated more effectively in their newsrooms, and experienced a renewed spirit of innovation and self-improvement as a result of their workshop experiences. Workshop participants also reported an extremely high level of positive feeling about the training – 95% of participants gave the workshops the highest available ratings in post-workshop evaluations of their training experiences.

[top]

What makes the Traveling Curriculum unique from other types of training we could bring to our newsroom?

CCJ Traveling Curriculum workshops are unique in that they take place on-location in a newsroom’s home community, include all levels of newsroom staff, place special emphasis on reflection and critical thinking, include intense discussions about controversial stories and issues, and emphasize active participation in the training experience.

[top]

Is CCJ training expensive? How much does it cost?

The Traveling Curriculum is supported by a grant from The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which allows CCJ to keep costs below what most other training programs charge. Like the workshops themselves, expenses can be customized to accommodate the unique circumstances of each newsroom, although flat fees for workshop preparation/materials and trainer expenses will apply in all cases.

Some newsrooms have sought to establish longer-term newsroom development agreements with the Committee that involve several visits or specialized training that targets particular issues or jobs. Training costs are negotiated for each individual agreement.

CCJ is committed to ensuring that the costs associated with the training remain very low. We encourage all news organizations, regardless of training budget or organization size, to contact a member of the Traveling Curriculum team to discuss how our sessions can be tailored to fit the needs of your news organization.

[top]

Who are the workshop facilitators?

A team of facilitators, as opposed to a single moderator, leads each Traveling Curriculum workshop. We have found that discussion not only between a facilitator and a group, but also between the facilitators themselves, promotes an open and free forum. If the group leaders feel free to disagree with one another the larger group should feel more able to offer their own thoughts and ideas, as opposed to simply going along with the mindset of a single presenter.

Our original facilitator group included Bill Kovach, Founding Chairman of the Committee of Concerned Journalists; Tom Rosenstiel, Director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism; and Bill Damon, Professor of Education and Director of the Center on Adolescence at Stanford University.

Over the years, a pool of talented, experienced current and former journalists has been added. This group includes: Gregory Favre, a Distinguished Fellow at the Poynter Institute and former executive editor of The Sacrament Bee; Butch Ward, a Distinguished Fellow at the Poynter Institute and former Philadelphia Inquirer journalist; Deborah Potter, executive director of NewsLab and former CNN anchor; Wally Dean, CCJ’s Broadcast Curriculum Coordinator and former CBS News staff producer and news assignment manager; Glenn Guzzo, former editor of The Denver Post; Rosalie Stemer, newsroom/writing coach and former copy editor at several publications; and Maud “Missy” Beelman, the projects editor for The Dallas Morning News, to name just a few.

Our facilitation team is customized to the needs and unique structure of the host organization. This might mean, for example, the addition of an individual with experience in a different medium or a high degree of familiarity with the business side of journalism.

[top]

What are the steps involved in setting up a workshop?

The mechanics of setting up a workshop are quite easy. When we receive your initial inquiry we will put you in touch with either the Print or Broadcast Training Manager. One of these individuals will work with you on the logistical details of the session (including meeting location and catering) and gather initial information regarding your organization and what you hope to accomplish from a Traveling Curriculum workshop.

Following that will be a series of conversations where we will work on the adaptation and customization of the Curriculum for your needs. This often includes our looking at some amount of your work product and the development of a survey form for your news staff and, perhaps, a selection of your readership.

If you are interested in setting up a workshop or would like more information about the Traveling Curriculum, please e-mail us.

[top]

How much preparation time is involved between inquiring about a workshop and the workshop taking place?

Much of this depends on the individual organization's situation. However, in order to allow time for research and development, as well as the need for time to fulfill the Committee's other duties and responsibilities, we are currently planning to hold to a schedule of no more than two organizations per month. As such, we will be scheduling and planning groups based largely on a first come, first served basis.

[top]

Is any post-workshop follow-up provided by CCJ?

Yes. We will take notes during our workshop with you and compile the ideas and suggestions of workshop participants into a report for distribution in the newsroom. This report will also draw upon the newsroom survey and "action plans" we will ask participants to fill out following the session listing a few things that either they as individuals or the organization could do to improve.

[top]

How can I attend CCJ training?

E-mail us at to discuss how we can customize training for your newsroom.

[top]

Does CCJ have a training program for citizens?

Yes, the Committee has developed a Traveling Curriculum module that encourages citizens to identify what they want from the news and to work in conjunction with news organizations and people in their communities to discuss this topic. These sessions are designed to be constructive public workshops and move beyond public gripe sessions. The workshops are built around creating a common language and sense of purpose between journalists and community members and focus on the concrete rather than the theoretical.

[top]

I want to participate in CCJ’s training program but can’t get my newsroom manager to bite on the idea. Is there still a way for me to participate on my own?

Yes. In instances where individuals have expressed interest in training but it hasn’t been possible to bring CCJ to their newsrooms, we’ve tried to arrange for them to participate in workshops conducted at nearby news organizations. While one of the most beneficial aspects of conducting training in a newsroom is bringing together colleagues for deeper discussions about core issues of journalism, journalists from other newsrooms can offer new perspectives and benefit from training lessons as well.

[top]

I’m a journalist but I don’t work in a traditional print or broadcast newsroom setting. Will CCJ still train my organization?

CCJ has conducted training at online, radio, student, “alternative,” and ethnic news organizations. Because of our customizable training offerings, we can adjust to newsrooms and journalists who work in all news media. The core principles on which the Traveling Curriculum are based transcend media, and the skills CCJ teaches lead to higher levels of critical thinking and self-reflection that translate across newsrooms in various media and of various size and makeup.

[top]

Does CCJ train outside the U.S.?

To date, the Traveling Curriculum has not formally ventured outside of the United States for training. However, CCJ trainers and representatives have given speeches and participated in group discussions and meetings with non-U.S. journalists in other countries. The Traveling Curriculum’s content and structure are always evolving. If you’re an international journalist who’d like to bring CCJ to your newsroom, e-mail us and we can discuss the possibility.

[top]