JOB: The Brown Institute

The Brown Institute is a unique, bi-coastal partnership between Columbia Journalism School (CJS) and Stanford’s School of Engineering. It was founded with a gift from Helen Gurley Brown (HGB) in 2012, and offers grants and development support for original work crossing journalism, media and technology. Each year, the Columbia and Stanford sides of the institute together award over $1M to help teams “follow their passions and experiment with new approaches to storytelling,” to paraphrase Gurley Brown. In the last 10 years, it has funded over 100 projects, supporting nearly 250 people. Some of these grants produced innovative works of journalism, others developed platforms to assist with creativity, and still others explored entirely new forms of expression.

The first position is more senior and we’ve called it “Director, Creative Research.” I’m not sure the name does it justice. We are looking for someone with a track record in experimenting with new technologies that extend the practice of journalism or media creation broadly. Technologies might include immersive storytelling platforms like AR and VR, or data visualization and coding… but the list is endless. The ideal candidate would enjoy bringing these experiences to CJS students and alumni, contributing to our annual educational program. They should also have an interest in helping teams of journalists and technologists pursue new projects or create new ventures. This aspect of the work is tremendously gratifying, as you see creative teams develop new kinds of reporting, uncover new stories, and craft new ways to structure and present stories. This collaborative aspect of the job might involve meeting with each team twice a month, say.

The second position is more junior, but still has a kind of split set of responsibilities. We called it an “Impact Fellow (Associate Research Scholar).” The ideal candidate will have a history of “creative research” that expands on traditional forms of journalism and media production, but will also want to collaborate with institute grantees, as well as CJS students and alumni, inspiring new entrepreneurs working at the intersection of tech and media. They will help develop the topics for our workshops and seminars, and will lend a hand presenting from their experience. And, like the more senior position, the Impact Fellow will have time to initiate and pursue their own work. Oh and the term “Impact” comes from Brown’s emphasis on supporting projects that will have significant social or other impacts.