Grants That Make a Difference

The University of Georgia's Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication has announced a $1.5 million grant from the Miami-based John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to create the Knight Chair in Health and Medical Journalism.

The grant will allow the college to develop and teach undergraduate and master's courses in health and medical journalism and create an outreach program aimed at improving the flow of health news to the Southern Black Belt, a rural strip of more than six hundred counties winding through eleven states that is home to a third of the nation's 34.6 million poor.

"The need for accurate, understandable health information is particularly acute in the consistently impoverished counties in the Southern Black Belt," said Grady College dean John Soloski. "The Knight Chair will help health care professionals improve their communication to the public by communicating better with journalists."

The University of Georgia is located in Athens at the center of the bioscience corridor between Atlanta and Augusta. The Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication is one of 14 schools and colleges at the University of Georgia, America’s first state-chartered university founded in 1785. The Grady College provides seven undergraduate majors: advertising, broadcast news, magazines, newspapers, public relations, publication management and telecommunication arts. The college offers two graduate degrees, and is home to the Peabody Awards, one of the premier programs in electronic media.

The holder of the chair will partner with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Medical College of Georgia, the Morehouse School of Medicine, Emory University, and other institutions in the region to develop programs to improve media coverage of health issues. Julie Gerberding, director of the CDC and an early supporter of establishing the chair, said well-trained health reporters are critical links in translating scientific research so that the public can make sound decisions about their personal health and the health of their communities. The college will begin its search to fill the chair in January 2005.

Recipient Contact Information:
Recipient Name: Grady College of Journalism & Mass Communication
Address: Journalism Building at Baldwin St. on Sanford Dr.
Athens, Georgia 30602-3018
Phone: 706-542-1704
FAX: 706-542-2183
URL: www.grady.uga.edu/

Grantmaker Contact Information:
Grantmaker Name: John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
Year Founded: 1950
Address:Wachovia Financial Ctr., Ste. 3300
200 S. Biscayne Blvd.
Miami, FL 33131-2349
Phone: 305-908-2600
Contact: Attn: Grant Request
Email: publications@knightfdn.org or web@knightfdn.org
URL: http://www.knightfdn.org


The selection of organizations for the "Grants that Make a Difference" is based on criteria such as programmatic interests, geographic focus, and size of funding programs to ensure the broadest possible representation of the region's nonprofit sector.
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