USC's selected as one of four programs to add spring position
The USC School of Journalism and Mass Communications will receive funding for a business journalism visiting professorship next semester.
The Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism at Arizona State University announced Thursday that USC’s is one of four journalism schools nationwide to receive funding under a $1.67 million grant from the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation.
Over the course of five years, the Reynolds Center will dole out 11 business journalism visiting professorships to 11 different schools. The other three programs selected for funding were Colorado State University, Grambling State University and Texas Christian University.
“I think it will help build the momentum we’ve been trying to build with an interest in business journalism,” said Carol Pardun, director of the School of Journalism and Mass Communications.
Pardun said USC’s Baldwin Business and Financial Journalism Fund and David J. Morrow Scholarship advance the priority to an extent, but adding a faculty member specifically for business journalism will expedite the process.
“Our faculty are very busy, they don’t have as much time as you’d hope you could have to work on initiatives like this,” Pardun said. “Having another person in the school, where this is what he’ll be thinking about all day is a luxury we don’t have.”
Linda Austin, executive director of the Reynolds Center, said USC’s School of Journalism was picked due to the priority the school places on increasing its emphasis on business journalism.
“The University of South Carolina has shown its commitment to enhancing its training in business journalism with a number of efforts, including a special topics course last summer in business journalism, the David J. Morrow/SABEW scholarship for students interested in business journalism, and its lectures, panels and workshops designed to stimulate interest in business journalism,” Austin said in an email response.
Pardun said the funding could help create more of a partnership between the journalism school and the Moore School of Business, especially if business students enroll in the new classes that will be offered.
“The Moore School believes in this as well,” she said. “This is yet another way to start to build more partnership in that direction.
“At the very least I think this will provide an opportunity for business students and our students to interact with each other.”