Published: Aug. 17, 2017

The University of Colorado Boulder’s Center for Environmental Journalism celebrates its 25th anniversary this month, as well as the 20th anniversary of the Ted Scripps Environmental Journalism Fellowship. The center, established in 1992, has hosted the Ted Scripps Fellowships since the 1997-98 academic year.CEJ logo

For more than two decades, the program—housed within the College of Media, Communication and Information—has brought journalists, scientists, faculty and students together to discuss and report on issues crucial to our environment.

Events, which are free and open to the public, will celebrate the anniversary on Saturday, Aug. 26, beginning with two panels featuring journalists and environmental experts. “Science and policy in uncertain times,” will begin at 10 a.m., followed by the panel, “After years of upheaval, is journalism finding its voice?" at 1 p.m. Both panels will take place in the ATLAS center on CU Boulder’s central campus.

The inaugural Ackland Lecture in Journalism—named in honor of CEJ founding Director Len Ackland—will begin at 7 p.m. featuring Juliet Eilperin, the Washington Post’s senior national affairs correspondent. Eilperin will deliver her lecture in the auditorium at the new Sustainability, Energy and Environment Complex.

The center also will celebrate the 100 journalists who have been awarded the Ted Scripps Environmental Journalism Fellowship, a rare opportunity for mid-career journalists to spend nine months studying and working on special projects with support from the center. The fellowship is funded by the Scripps Howard Foundation.

“Their work during and after the fellowship has yielded numerous impactful stories, more than a dozen books, a Pulitzer prize—and even an entire investigative news network whose work has led to changes in multiple Colorado laws,” said CEJ Director Tom Yulsman.

The new class of 2017-18 fellows joining the first 100 includes: Sadie Babits, who recently served as the news director at Colorado Public Radio; Jeff Burnside, most recently the senior investigative reporter for KOMO TV Seattle; Lindsay Fendt, a freelance reporter who joins the program after spending five years based in San José, Costa Rica, where she covered stories throughout Latin America; Jason Plautz, a Washington, D.C.-based journalist who has covered energy and environment policy for National Journal and E&E Publishing; and Lynette Wilson, who spent the last eight years covering human rights and social justice issues for the Episcopal News Service.

Learn more about the CU Boulder Center for Environmental Journalism and the Ted Scripps Fellowships in Environmental Journalism »

 

Contact:
Tom Yulsman, Center for Environmental Journalism Director

Stephanie Cook, CMCI, 303-408-4439