Two recent Columbia grads launch nonprofit to finance business journalism
Maha Rafi Atal
Damian Kahya
Two recent graduates of Columbia University’s Master’s in Business Journalism program have launched Public Business, a nonprofit journalism foundation that will offer fellowships for business reporting in the public interest.
They are Maha Rafi Atal, who will serve as executive director in New York, and Damian Kahya, its president and a freelancer based in London. Both graduated from the Columbia program in 2009.
Funding for a three- to 12-month fellowship would range from $3,000 to $20,000, according to the group’s website. “Funding for special reports and series ranges from $1,000 to $10,000. Stories should ideally fall under 5,000 words or 15 minutes of airtime, though we will also fund longer pieces.” The group aims to support public-interest reporting about the impact businesses have on the economy, the environment and society.
The group is seeking donors, as well as members, who will contribute $10 a month.
Its founding trustees are Columbia Professors Geoffrey Heal, James B. Stewart and Sylvia Nasar, plus Anya Schiffrin, director of the international media program at Columbia and a veteran correspondent for Dow Jones Newswires; Deborah Hargreaves, chairwoman of the High Pay Commission in the United Kingdom and former business editor of the Guardian, and John Lloyd, director of journalism at the Reuters Institute at Oxford University.
“We felt that the high standards and ethics of reporting we learned at Columbia were not being met in the real media world outside,” Atal said. “Newsroom revenues were collapsing, leaving scant funding for this kind of work. Many young reporters were struggling to master complex stories with insufficient training or business background. And journalists weren’t communicating well with sources outside business — in academia or the nonprofit world — to build a complete picture of businesses and their impact. Our programs aim to address all three of these challenges, and restore business journalism’s commitment to the public interest.”
For more information, email Atal, who was a Reynolds Center-supported intern at Fortune in summer 2009.
