Veteran CBC national news reporter Chris Brown and data journalist Caitlin Havlak are joining the School of Journalism as adjunct professors for the upcoming 2016-17 academic year.
They are joining returning adjunct faculty who bring seasoned reporting and niche expertise into the classroom, enhancing the range of skills and knowledge offered by the School of Journalism.
Returning adjuncts include Dave Beers, who is coming back to teach the Feature Writing course. Beers will be joined by new adjunct, journalist and author James MacKinnon whose works include the best-seller, The 100-Mile Diet.
The new host of CBC’s Cross Country Checkup, Duncan McCue, will continue his Reporting in Indigenous Communities course in a new long-distance format from Toronto.
The School is also welcoming back UBC computer science prof Tamara Munzner, journalist Frances Bula, video journalist Dan McKinney, and media lawyer Dan Burnett.
Data-driven journalism
Havlak joins the school to co-teach the Data Vizualization module with Munzner. Havlak has a background in data analysis and interactive programming using data visualization.
She switched those skills over to journalism when she started as Director of Digital and Data Journalism at Discourse Media. She oversees the production of all the data journalism and digital interactive work at Discourse.
“Data journalism is really important, and we don’t always use it super well,” Havlak said.
“Traditional journalism approach is to find a story with anecdotal evidence, and what data can really bring to that story is quantitative evidence to back that up.”
She says newsrooms expect some journalists to have some knowledge of data visualization.
“I’m really excited to introduce data-driven journalism as a way to do really deep investigative journalism,” she said. “I really see a future in data-driven stores. I feel excited to introduce that to the students and I’m excited to learn a lot in the process.”
Tell B.C. stories
Vancouver-based CBC reporter Chris Brown will join professors Kathryn Gretsinger and Frances Bula in Integrated Journalism. Brown has worked with CBC since 1993 and started at The National in 2004.
He has reported in Afghanistan on two foreign assignments; covered the 2004 Indonesian earthquake; and was The National’s lead reporter on the 2011 Japanese Tsunami. For him, B.C. is a great base for journalists.
“Domestically here, we’ve got great chances to tell stories up and down the B.C. coast,” said Brown. “It’s never been more important now to tell great character-driven stories, when there’s so many other ways for people to get information.”
Brown has received recognition for his own great stories. He was nominated three times in the 2015 Jack Webster awards, and won for “Best Feature Story – Television” for his teamwork on CBC’s “City Fix: How Our Cities are Making Us Sick.”
He’s taken home awards from the New York Festivals and the Canadian Association of Journalists.
“UBC is a quality institution,” said Brown. “I think that fact that the school wants to continue to make it important that students learn what makes a great story, how to find great characters, how to create great content – I think that’s an exciting thing to be a part of.”
Returning adjuncts
Dave Beers, founder of The Tyee, returns to the school after a year-long hiatus to teach Feature Writing. He began teaching Feature Writing at the school back in 2001. He took the past year off to focus on more time at home, as well as working as a documentary story producer. He also produced a widely shared, in-depth piece on Harper for the national election.
Beers’ passion for solutions-based journalism led him to found the Tyee Solutions Society. He has more than 30 years of experience behind him, including working at Mother Jones, The San Francisco Examiner, and the Vancouver Sun. He’s received multiple awards including two Edward R. Murrow Awards, a Canadian National Newspaper Award, and National Magazine Awards in the U.S. and Canada.
He is eager to return to the school for Feature Writing.
“Every time I teach it, it’s new, because it’s so student-based,” Beers said. “Every student chooses their own topic. The course takes on its own flavor depending on who’s in the room.”
Beers says past projects have focused on anything from a podcast to photo essays to multimedia feature pieces.
“I really enjoy teaching and connecting with the new generation of journalists,” Beers said. “Complex storytelling can be very daunting. If you take this course, you should produce the most amazing piece of journalism you’ve ever done. The course breaks down the process into small bites that aren’t so anxiety-inducing and then we help you [tackle] them.”
Online teaching
CBC reporter Duncan McCue, creator and teacher of Reporting in Indigenous Communities (RIIC) course, recently took over as the new host of Cross Country Checkup in Toronto. He will continue to lead the course, combining online teaching and in-person intensive sessions, co-teaching with Gretsinger.
“It was incredibly important to me that RIIC continue in some form because we spent a great deal of time building the program,” McCue said. “I feel like we have built relationships with the communities we are partnered in and the students have produced remarkable work every year.”
McCue says Gretsinger will now be in the class on a weekly basis and he will still join in weekly via Skype, email, and one-on-one mentoring.
“Given the growth of online teaching, it was entirely possible for me to be teaching even though I’m based in Toronto now,” McCue said. “I’ll be showing up in Vancouver at the school for a couple of one-day intensives.”
McCue said it was very important for him to continue with RIIC.
“We’re leading the way in the country – other journalism schools have little to show for [Indigenous reporting]. UBC has led the way in terms of introducing Indigenous content to journalism students so I wanted to make sure that content, and RIIC, continues.”
Classes start on September Tuesday 6 2016.
