Schooling in New York

NYU

On June 16th, students woke up in the Big Apple and started a week’s study at New York University’s (NYU) journalism department. There they got a chance to meet Bethany McLean, the award winning financial journalist, famous for uncovering the Enron scandal. She talked about her reporting of current financial scandals, about the process of organizing complicated material and making financial material come alive, as well as her recent work for Vanity Fair covering the downfall of Steven A. Cohen and the SAC hedge fund.

On Tuesday, students met Larry Rubenstein, Capital Markets Managing Counsel for Wells Fargo. As an expert in securitized assets, Larry talked them through the growth of securitized assets in the US, the development of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and how that differs from the European model. He also talked about the housing boom and the current state of both the housing market and the securitized debt markets today in the aftermath of the financial crisis.

The New York Times

The Wall Street Journal

On Wednesday, Kim Ruhl, economics professor at NYU’s Stern Business School provided students with a general view of the US economy, the recovery and budget/political issues with an emphasis on the differences in the political and economic situations in the UK, Europe and the US. In the afternoon, students had the chance to quiz Gerard Baker, editor in chief at The Wall Street Journal, the largest newspaper in the United States which has a circulation of about 2.4 million copies.

The following day, Sean Capperis, a Data Manager and Research Analyst at the Furman Center, lectured them on income inequality in the region. A week of interesting lectures was rounded off by Leslie Wayne, former New York Times business reporter and NYU adjunct, who talked about corporate corruption and the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, its global reach and how businessmen, kleptocrats and government officials are increasingly being caught by it.

 

China – Journalism in Action

BEIJING:

In the world of journalism, practice should never fall behind the theory. Despite a very enriching academic programme, students had a chance to get an insight of how the industry of the financial journalism works in reality. In the middle of the week in Beijing, students were invited by the British Council in China to the UK-China annual People to People Dialogue with Chinese Vice Premier Liu Yandong and British ministers and officials. This was followed by the British Council networking event where students met with British and Chinese students studying British businesses in China in a friendly atmosphere at Hotel Éclat.

At the end of the week, students visited the offices of the British Council, Cultural and Educational arm of the British Embassy, where they were learned about living and working in China and heard from Guardian correspondent Tania Branigan, herself a City graduate. Lastly, students took a little break from journalism and went to explore the beauty of Chinese landmarks such as the Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square and the Great Wall of China.

SHANGHAI:

Shanghai Media Group tour

Students visited the European Chamber of Commerce where they learnt about business in China, trade liberalization and recent developments such as the Shanghai Free Trade Zone. This was followed by a visit to Shanghai Media Group – a multimedia television and radio broadcasting, news and Internet company, as well as the second biggest media group in China. Thanks to Fudan’s media connections, students also saw the newsroom of Shanghai Daily, the largest English-language news portal in East China.

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Schooling in China

BEIJING

Tsinghua University

In April, 15 City Financial Journalism students travelled to China, first to Beijing and then to Shanghai. For the first week, students were based at Tsinghua University’s Global Business Journalism department in Beijing. The week started with lectures on understanding media policy and development by Min Hang, Director of the Global Business Journalism Program. Students also participated in the panel discussion with Tsinghua journalism students on business news data mining and analysis led by Lee Miller, Editor-at-Large for Bloomberg News.

Zhenzhi  Guo, PhD, Professor of Broadcasting History sparked students’ interest with a fascinating discussion of the difficulties faced by broadcasters relating to censorship and political interference. Qingan Zhou, Director of International Communication Program and an anchor at CCTV, provided an international perspective on public diplomacy and relations in China. The very productive week was topped off by a lecture on multi-media and how it has changed journalism in the USA, China and around the world.

Students heard from Rick Dunham, a veteran political journalist and one of America’s foremost authorities on the use of social media for journalism. During the whole week students were accompanied and lectured by top academics and experts in the industry who introduced them to a very different reporting and editorial culture.

SHANGHAI

Fudan University

On Sunday April 27, students moved to another cradle of the financial world – Shanghai. They were warmly welcome by Fudan University, one of the oldest and most selective universities in China. The programme was very vivid and business-like and students had lots of opportunities to see how the financial industry works from inside. 

They started with a lecture on Applied Media Management by Dr David Maguire, a former journalist at Shanghai Daily and former editor of Sunday Morning Post in Hong Kong. Doug Young, Reuters Correspondent and author of “The Party Line: How the Media Dictates Public Opinion in Modern China”, took students through group exercises on how both Chinese and foreign media report financial news in China, and the challenges and restrictions of their reporting.

Marjorie Deane Financial Journalism Foundation

The Marjorie Deane Financial Journalism Foundation was set up by Marjorie Deane, a former Deputy Business Editor of The Economist. Marjorie represented The Economist at the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

She was also behind the start of a new publication, The Economist Financial Report, a fortnightly newsletter that she edited for 13 years. After a long and successful career in financial journalism, Marjorie decided to encourage young people to follow in her footsteps. Her foundation started in 1998 and she was active in its affairs until her death in October 2008.

The formal aims of the Foundation are to advance the education of the public in financial and monetary theory and institutions and financial journalism by providing work experience for students and young people, and to provide financial support, to commission research and to provide vocational training.

John Micklethwait, the editor-in-chief of The Economist and a trustee of the foundation, said about Marjorie:

“Marjorie Deane was passionately interested in journalism and American finance—and she loved New York. …. The foundation has already had (great success) in encouraging people to learn more about financial journalism in Britain.”