Clark named WUNC’s Fletcher Fellow for Education Policy Reporting

North Carolina Public Radio WUNC and the UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media named Jess Clark its Fletcher Fellow for Education Policy Reporting from 2015 to 2017.  Clark graduated from UNC with a Master’s in Journalism in 2015.

Clark follows Reema Khrais as the second recipient of a 2-year post-graduate journalism fellowship, funded by the A.J. Fletcher Foundation and dedicated to in-depth radio reporting on under-covered education issues. Khrais became the inaugural Fletcher Fellow in 2013.

“Education is one of the most important issues for our listeners,” says WUNC Program Director David Brower. “This partnership gives us the reporter-strength to better serve the community in this area.”

The partnership between the school and the station serves as a model for advanced journalism training to develop thoughtful policy reporters for the community. WUNC editors provide extensive training and daily oversight of the Reporting Fellow. In addition, UNC journalism faculty serve as mentors, providing guidance on the reporting, developing multimedia content and negotiating with other media outlets to become partners in distributing the content.

“We’ve established a model for journalism education that links theory with practice in a way that serves the community with deeper reporting on such a critical issue for our state,” said Susan King, dean of the UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media.  

Clark has extensive multimedia experience from her work as a managing editor for wholehog.org, a special report on North Carolina’s hog industry from the school’s award-winning interactive series, “Powering A Nation.” She brings broadcast experience from working as a reporter for Carolina Connection, the school’s student-produced radio newscast. Her stories have been featured on WUNC, WAMC and PRX’s “Storytime” newsletter. She has interned with the production team for WUNC's “The State of Things” and reported for WCHL on local schools and state policy among other issues.

“I am drawn to education reporting because I want to change the way the media covers education,” Clark said. “Most education stories are reported from legislatures and boardrooms. This kind of coverage is important, but it is equally crucial to report from classrooms and households.”

“We want to support great reporting that informs the North Carolina community,” said Damon Circosta, executive director and vice president of the Fletcher Foundation. “We are investing in two strong organizations committed to that mission.”

About North Carolina Public Radio® – WUNC

WUNC is a news and information station that serves listeners with a mix of national, international and state news.  It is the most listened to public radio station in the state and was a recent winner of an Edward R Murrow Award for excellence in journalism.  It is licensed to WUNC Public Radio LLC, an affiliate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

About A.J. Fletcher Foundation

The mission of Fletcher Foundation is to support nonprofit organizations in their endeavors to enrich the lives and well-being of people in North Carolina.  To achieve this, AJF partners with nonprofit organizations that recognize and solve social and civic problems and provides resources to advance big, bold ideas.  For more information, visit www.ajf.org.