Rio Grande Members Invited to Apply for New Fellowship Program
to Encourage Examination of Healthcare Systems
The Association of Health Care Journalists has announced a new fellowship program to help journalists understand and report on the performance of local healthcare systems and the U.S. health system as a whole. Supported by the Commonwealth Fund, the AHCJ Media Fellowships on Health Performance provides for training as well as field reporting assistance.
The program is intended to give mid-career journalists print, broadcast, and online reporters an opportunity to learn about examples of high-performing healthcare systems, to focus on innovations in care delivery, and to explore a system or its significant parts to determine what makes that system effective or ineffective.
Each reporter will continue in his or her current job and will be expected to complete a significant and unique reporting project by the end of the fellowship year in June 2011. The field reporting assistance will allow them to complete site visits for interviewing relevant stakeholders, collecting data relevant to the health systems and employing any technology to deliver multiplatform stories.
Interested reporters should have a minimum of ten years’ professional journalism experience. Some health reporting experience is a plus.
The Commonwealth Fund grant will cover the costs of fellows attending two customized seminars in New York, AHJC’s annual conference, a regional health journalism workshop, and up to $6,000 in individual field reporting and research support. Fellows will also receive mentor support and individual consultation on their projects. Four fellowships will be awarded for 2010-11.
Complete program information can be found here.