Four veteran education journalists joined Columbia Journalism School for the 2022-2023 academic year as the newest group of Spencer Education Journalism Fellows to study and produce significant works of education journalism.
This class of 2023 brings a depth of professional experience to the fellowship, which was launched with Spencer Foundation support 15 years ago to enhance education journalism with deep research.
The current cohort features two residential fellows, including Matt Barnum, Chalkbeat’s national policy and politics reporter, who will focus his Spencer year on exploring the enduring debate about whether money matters in education. Janet Lorin writes about higher education finance at Bloomberg News. She plans to explore the financial inequalities of a set of public Historically Black Colleges and Universities in the context of the wealthiest U.S. colleges.
Our two non-residential fellows include Erin Einhorn, a Detroit-based national reporter for NBC News, who plans to produce a special series on the consequences and alternatives to harsh exclusionary school discipline. Emily Richmond is the public editor of the Education Writers Association and host of the EWA Radio podcast. Based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Richmond will spend her Spencer year examining the history and current landscape of the far-reaching school system run by the Department of Defense Education Activity.
A distinguished board of scholars and journalists selected the winners in March 2022, after a competitive application process. The Spencer Foundation awards each fellow with project expenses plus a stipend ($85,000 residential, $43,000 non-residential). In addition, the fellows receive research and journalistic support from Columbia professors at the Journalism School as well as throughout the university.
“We are pleased to welcome this talented group of journalists to our Spencer Fellowship network,” said LynNell Hancock, director of the Spencer Fellowship and professor emerita at Columbia Journalism School. “They will join 48 alums who have produced game-changing books, documentaries, podcasts and newspaper and magazine work over the last 15 years.”