Fall Deadline: November 15, 2015 | Apply here
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Eligibility: Open to anyone with at least five years professional experience in journalism.
Amount: Award grants of $5,000 a month for one to three months.
The Harold W. McGraw, Jr. Center for Business Journalism, a new initiative established at the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism, began offering Fellowships to accomplished business journalists in the summer of 2014. Seven veteran journalists were awarded grants of up to $15,000 in the first year of the McGraw Fellowship; three more were named in July, 2015.
The aim of the McGraw Fellowship for Business Journalism is to support in-depth, ambitious coverage of critical issues related to the global economy and business. In an age when many news organizations no longer have the resources to tackle complex, time-consuming stories, the Fellowships enable experienced journalists to do the deep reporting needed to produce a serious piece of investigative, analytic, or narrative journalism.
About the Fellowship
The McGraw Fellowship provides editorial and financial support to journalists who need the time and resources to produce a significant story or series that provides fresh insight into an important business or economic topic. We accept applications for in-depth text, video or audio pieces, and we encourage proposals that take advantage of more than one storytelling form to create a multimedia package.
Typically, we’ll award grants of $5,000 a month for one to three months; in exceptional cases, we’ll consider longer grants based upon specific proposals. We’ll look for applicants with a proven ability to report and execute a complex project in their proposed medium; ideally, candidates will also have a strong background or reporting expertise on the subject of their piece.
The McGraw Center provides editorial supervision during the Fellowship. We work with the Fellows to develop their projects during the reporting phase and frequently edit the completed stories. We also assist with placing the articles. In some cases, we partner with established print, radio or digital outlets; in others we will publish them as e-books or through the CUNY J-School’s book imprint. The stories also run on the McGraw Center website.
Eligibility
The McGraw Fellowship for Business Journalism is open to anyone with at least five years professional experience in journalism. Freelance journalists, as well as reporters and editors currently working at a news organization, may apply. Applications will generally be accepted twice a year, in the spring and again in the fall. The spring deadline for applications is May 15, 2015; the fall deadline is November 15, 2015. However, we will consider time-sensitive projects on a case-by-case basis outside of the deadline periods. For more information about the program, please contact mcgrawcenter@journalism.cuny.edu.
How to Apply
Applicants should submit a well-focused story proposal of no more than three pages through the accompanying online form. Think of it as pitch, much like you would submit to an editor at a newspaper, magazine, digital outlet, or radio station. The proposal should highlight what’s new and significant about the story, why it matters and what its potential impact might be. If the subject has been covered elsewhere, the proposal should note where those stories have run and how the proposed piece would differ. In addition, applicants should enclose three journalism samples. The samples should be professionally published work that showcases your ability to tackle an in-depth story in the proposed medium. Please also provide us with a resume and references from two editors or others familiar with your work.
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