Date: Feb 28, 2013

Hofstra University to Host Specialized Reporting Institute on Suburban Poverty

Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY - The School of Communication at Hofstra University will host a journalism workshop on suburban poverty that is part of a nationwide series aimed at helping reporters produce smart, nuanced coverage of the critical issues of the day.    

The seminar for working journalists, “Poverty in the Suburbs: The New Poor, the Old Poor and the Growing Poor,” will be held at Hofstra University on Thursday and Friday, Sept. 26-27, 2013. The event  is funded by the Robert R. McCormick Foundation, in partnership with The Poynter Institute for Media Studies.

“As poverty in the suburbs continues to be a burgeoning problem, it is important to provide reporters and editors at small to mid-sized media outlets the skills necessary to cover suburbia’s rapidly changing demographics," said School of Communication Dean Evan Cornog. " We are delighted to partner with the McCormick Foundation and Poynter to promote intelligent, sustained, and well-informed press coverage of an issue affecting so many communities.”

Hofstra was selected as a host from among almost 60 applicants.  Six other Specialized Reporting Institutes will be held throughout the country from April through October on hot-button topics such as covering guns, Medicare, immigration reform, and sex trafficking.  Each host will produce a webinar on its assigned topic and a page of reporting resources on Poynter’s e-learning site, News University (www.NewsU.org).   Journalists who attend a workshop are required to produce significant coverage on the issue.

The free workshops, which include tuition, travel and hotel costs for selected reporters, are funded through a $710,000 two-year grant from the McCormick Foundation to Poynter, an international media strategy center and school for journalists.   The Robert R. McCormick Foundation is a charitable trust established in 1955 that is dedicated to fostering a strong democracy through educated and informed citizens.  It developed the SRI program in 2007 to provide a greater level of expertise and training about key issues for journalists, and the yearly workshops include a diverse group of participants across all media platforms. 

Reporters interested in applying for the workshop at Hofstra can visit www.coveringsuburbanpoverty.com for more information.  More information about other upcoming workshops in the series can be found at  www.poynter.org. 

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About the  School of Communication 

The School of Communication provides students with a superior education and real-world experience that prepares them to meet the challenges of the 21st century job market. It offers undergraduate and graduate coursework in multimedia journalism, media studies and public relations; radio, television and film production; and speech communication, rhetoric and performance studies, taught by an award-winning faculty. The school is also home to WRHU 88.7 FM Radio Hofstra University, the flagship station of the New York Islanders, and state-of-the-art resources such as NewsHub, an innovative multimedia classroom and newsroom,  as well as a three-story, 3,750 square foot studio for television and film productions, cutting-edge control rooms, editing facilities and a new screening room.

About Hofstra University

Hofstra University is a dynamic private institution of higher education where more than 11,000 full and part-time students choose from undergraduate and graduate offerings in liberal arts and sciences, business, communication, education, health and human services, honors studies, a School of Engineering and Applied Science, a School of Law and the Hofstra North Shore-LIJ School of Medicine.