The King’s College Cancels Classes After Laying Off Faculty

The King’s College announced that it will not hold classes for the Fall 2023 semester and is pausing operations until further notice as of Monday, July 17.

As a result of ongoing financial turmoil and having its accreditation revoked, the college decided to temporarily close while in search of a “strategic alliance.” The college began publicly looking for a partner in Jan. 2023, and ended its former partnership with Primacorp in April. 

“The Board of Trustees has determined King's will not be offering classes for the fall 2023 semester,” the email read. “We emphasize that this is not a decision to close The King's College permanently. The Board of Trustees and senior administration will continue to navigate the College's next steps and contend for King's future over the coming months.”

“The decision to not hold classes this fall was very difficult, but with so many changes taking place it was also necessary,” Dr. Henry Bleattler, the new interim provost, said of the announcement. “We want only to offer the best education we can. By taking a break from classes the administration and board can focus on finding a long-term path forward, which has always been the goal.”

One of the potential partners from earlier this year, Alliance University (formerly Nyack College), also announced its closure after losing its accreditation. As a result of Alliance and King’s closures, there are currently no Protestant/evangelical Christian colleges operating in New York City.

College closures run rampant across America, especially among religious colleges. Christianity Today reported that at least 18 Christian colleges have closed since 2020. 

Several scholars and King’s faculty lamented the lack of Christian higher education in New York. 

“There are now zero Protestant Christian colleges in New York City… The  missional/church planting movement never believed in us,” Dr. Anthony Bradley said in a tweet on June 30. He continued in a thread, “It's not the money, it’s enrollment. Christian families, led by their pastors, no longer value Christian higher education because it’s not a church.” 

The King’s College has been open since 1938, Alliance University has been open since 1882 and Concordia College was open from 1881-2021. Despite the history of these colleges, they each struggled to meet the enrollment and fundraising quotas necessary to tackle the high cost of functioning in New York City, especially post-pandemic.

“Our brand is what sets us apart: our focus on excellence in and out of the classroom, a Christian classical liberal arts curriculum rooted in Politics, Philosophy and Economics and our New York City setting,” Bleattler said. “Our brand is really like that of no other Christian college. That is what our resilience is rooted in — and if we survive, it will be because of that. And the will of God, of course.”

King’s reportedly intended to appeal the Middle States Commission on Higher Education’s decision, which would prohibit the college from accepting or recruiting any new students until the institute regains an accredited status according to section II.P of the Appeals from Adverse Actions Procedures. The appeal process allows the college to present “new intervening financial information only once” and the outcome of the appeal process “is final and binding on the institution.” 

MSCHE announced on July 27 that it “will consider the institution closed and no longer operational” and “this institutional closure terminates The King's College's appeal.” MSCHE requires that the college provide a substantive change request for closure by Aug. 11, and the commission will determine the final status of the college’s accreditation after that request is processed.

The board informed faculty and staff of the decision to cease operations in a meeting on Monday, July 17, a few hours before the email was sent out. Many faculty found other jobs in anticipation for the school’s closure, some made temporary plans and a few waited on King’s final answer.

“In this last, tough semester, I added a couple more roles, including development director (had the privilege of helping to raise $1.2M in 12 weeks from our generous parents, alumni, faculty, staff, and friends), and most recently, interim provost,” Dr. Kimberly Reeve said on LinkedIn. “It's sad to be ending with uncertainty over our future, but I know the legacy of King's lives on in each student, faculty and staff member, alum, and parent.” 

Reeve spearheaded a significant amount of the college’s financial planning and communication, largely  via emails and Community Updates, throughout the Spring 2023 semester. Reeve also recently announced she will be dean of the business program at St. Peter’s University in Jersey City, N.J. 

Some faculty continue to work for King’s in various capacities with the hope of saving the college. 

“I love The King’s College and aim to do everything I can to help the college succeed,” Bleattler said. “Working here has been my life’s calling.  When I retire, I want to do so knowing I gave The King’s College everything I had. I can tell you that the board is working overtime to implement a long-term solution. I know this sounds like a broken record, as we’ve been hearing this for the last six months, but they really are working diligently to save the college.”

Around 40 dedicated students remained committed to The King’s College in June, prior to the college’s hiatus announcement. The college assured students and their families that it will provide academic and financial aid advising resources for those students as they plan their fall semester.

“Transferring wasn’t something I wanted to do; it complicates all of my plans for my senior year and is a major upset. I’m not happy that I have to transfer but I can’t wait around for King’s to open again to get my degree,” said Aidan Kurth, who transferred to Fordham University. He noted that he made transfer plans in May, though he waited until after King’s announcement to officially commit to Fordham. 

King’s organized a teach-out program in anticipation for the potential closure, and many of those options are still available to King’s students. 

“I kind of expected it at this point because of the way things were going. Obviously, the college is supposed to have high hopes, but it would have been nice to hear about it sooner,” said Steven Nasar, a sophomore transferring to Touro University. “They did try to help us out with the transfer fair… I tried to transfer to Fordham, but the Fordham [school] they were transferring us to as an option was only a night school so I didn't end up using that. So they did help us, but to which schools they were helping us was a different story. You don’t really get exactly what you want, in that case.” 

Nasar resorted to his own resources when deciding on a school to transfer to rather than utilizing King’s resources, but he noted that many of his peers benefited from the teach-out plan. 

“I started applying to other schools right around spring break because at that point everyone was sure King’s was closing,” said Matthew Peterson, a sophomore transferring to Baruch College in New York. “I didn’t take any further steps after the applications had gone in until probably May because at the end there it seemed like there was some miraculous chance that King’s was going to make it. 

Once King’s announced its decision to pause operations, students like Peterson started moving forward with their backup plans.

“I moved forward with Baruch, where it appeared that I could get a decent education without breaking my back financially,” Peterson said. “I hadn’t fully let go of going to King’s, however, until they sent the final email saying they were closed this year.”

Some first-semester seniors participated in an accelerated degree-earning option over the summer, which ends on July 28 and remains unaffected by both the revoked accreditation and the college’s closure. These students also participated in the May 6 graduation ceremony.

Other seniors transferred, which in many cases means that they will lose some credits in the process. Most of the colleges in King’s teach-out program accept up to 60 transfer credits, with a few such as St. John’s University and Fordham University’s School of Professional and Continuing Studies accepting up to 90 credits. Some students noted that the schools they transferred to were flexible with the transfer credit policy because of the students’ situation.

“Since the end of last semester, I planned for and acted toward Fordham as my backup,” said Alice Milchik, a senior transferring to Fordham University. “I am so sad I probably won’t see all these people together again, and that I won’t ever experience a King’s graduation or certain classes or leadership roles that I was looking forward to. As for my new campus, I’m there for one year and plan to just graduate with good grades rather than involve myself as much as I did with King’s.”

Many students anticipated filling leadership roles in student organizations at King’s, and now must reevaluate their approach to campus involvement in a new environment.

“Since the initial announcement of financial struggles in January, I've been looking into options to transfer. The more they pushed back a statement, the less hopeful I was about returning in the fall,” said Shayley Burroughs, who was voted Student Body President for 2023-24. “The last few months have also been disheartening. The people of King’s are unlike any other, and it’s sad to think I won’t see most of them again. I plan to be as involved as possible in my next college community, but with only a year and a half left I’m not sure I’ll be able to be as involved as I was at King’s, which is also disappointing.” 

The Student Development team plans to preserve the House system by putting house artifacts in storage. “If and when King’s can reopen, these will be a vital part of continuing the legacy of King’s and building on the foundation of what has come before,” former Director of Student Development Joey Willis said in an email to house executive teams. Willis requested that each House nominate a “Custodian” who will keep some “essential house artifacts” and serve as “a point of contact for the newly placed House members at King’s should [it] restart” and “meet with the King’s 3.0 students to pass on traditions.”

There are still a few Catholic or conservative colleges in the New York City area, as well as many colleges with a liberal arts curriculum. King’s emphasized that it is not permanently closing, and there are still faculty and alumni working to revive the college. Despite this intention MSCHE is treating the college as closed, and many students expressed that their only option is to move on from King’s.

“To be honest, I feel very little emotion about the whole thing now,” said Peterson. “And I loved King’s. The most frustrating thing to me has been the inability to move forward because, for King’s, there was always a carrot dangled in front of us that maybe they were going to make it. In a community of idealists, few were willing to let it die without trying everything humanly possible — probably to their own detriment.”

This story was originally published at The Empire State Tribune.

Can New York City be Everyone’s Campus?

When touring colleges, The King’s College might have looked a little different from other colleges and universities. Instead of a campus built on a plot of land, King’s occupies three floors in a Lower Manhattan office building. If you were to look through some of the brochures, you would see the phrase, “New York City is your campus.” But is this really the case for all students?

King’s currently has one on-campus housing location in Downtown Brooklyn. The commute to school poses unique challenges and complicates daily functioning for students with disabilities looking to possibly attend King’s.

The most affordable and practical way for students to commute to school is, by far, the subway. No other mode of transportation in New York City is as comprehensive or cost-effective as the subway.

Still, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) public transportation system must take several strides to make the subway system more accessible. 

Why is the MTA in New York City so notoriously inaccessible? 

The MTA subway system is an artifact from a world before the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. While this law focused on protecting Americans with disabilities from discrimination in the workplace, it also mandated that public places be accessible to people with disabilities. 

The New York City Subway opened in October 1904, which means they were constructed long before the accessibility mandates. Most buildings in New York City were also built before the passing of the ADA, which further limits the accessibility of the city as a whole.

Currently, just 126 out of 472 stations are accessible. Thirty years since the passing of the ADA,  more than two-thirds of all subway stations remain inaccessible. 

City Point, the only on-campus housing location King’s offers, is described as “a fifteen-minute train ride from campus” on the King’s website. However, this is only true from the Hoyt Street station, which is currently inaccessible. 

“Most people use the Hoyt Street station, which is not accessible to me,” said Lauren Brooks, a Fall 2022 NYCJ Semester student who uses a wheelchair. “So, I either go to Jay Street-Metrotech, DeKalb Avenue or, if worse comes to worst, Atlantic Avenue, which is a 20-minute walk.”

ADA presented subway stations with a unique challenge when forced to transition to accessibility. Most stations are under busy streets, so reconstruction is constrained by the location of the tracks. But what do subway stations need to be considered accessible? 

The vast majority of stations are only accessible through stairs from the street level, the mezzanine, and finally, the platform. Stairs are not an option for someone who uses a wheelchair, crutches or a walker. Adding elevators for subway stations is difficult because construction is restricted by underground infrastructure, space available on street level, and space available within the station. Additionally, people with disabilities need escalators to make traveling from the station to the platform more accessible. 

The MTA must also address the gap between the platform and the train to improve accessibility. For someone using a walker or a wheelchair, this gap is hard to avoid when boarding and exiting the train. These gaps can often be too wide, too high or too low for someone to safely travel from the train to the platform or vice versa.

“If you were in the middle, the front or the back, we still need to work on being able to get a wheelchair or walker in safely,” said Christopher Greif, Executive Member of the New York City Transit Riders Council, in an interview. “We need to know what stations have this problem.”

Brooks echoes the problem of the gap between the subway car and the platform. 

“I was coming home one night, and because of the gap, my front wheels got stuck, and my friends had to push my chair up onto the subway,” said Brooks.

Aside from public transit, Brooks also faces the inaccessibility of New York City as a whole. 

“New York, in general, is terrible with accessibility,” said Brooks. “But nowhere is great. I'm from the LA area, so I'm not coming from greatness either. Broken or cracked sidewalks that pushed me onto the street, that's the norm here. I didn't expect a utopia. I would be silly to.”

On her TikTok account, Brooks documents the inaccessibility of establishments in New York City. One post, which showed a coffee shop entrance only accessible by a step, amassed 820,700 views.

For future students, there is hope. In June 2022, the MTA pledged to make 95% of stations accessible by 2055, 

Under the terms of the agreement, the MTA will add elevators or ramps to create a stair-free path of travel at 95 percent of the currently inaccessible subway stations by 2055. 

Andy Byford, who served on the New York City Transit Council from 2017 to 2021, was instrumental in the recent strides of modernization in the subway. He spearheaded the “Fast Forward” program, which along with signal improvements, aims to make 50 more stations accessible.

“Since Andy Byford was the president of MTA, there has been more accessibility,” said Grief. “More elevators, more ramps, bigger signages. They’re working hard to make sure public transportation is the safe way to travel.”

From Oct. 2019 to Jan. 2022, the Jay St. Metrotech station was used as an “accessibility lab” for new features intended to make navigating the subway easier for those with cognitive, visual or motor impairments. These include “tactile guideways,” colorful way-finding stripes on station floors and stairs, Braille signage and interactive subway maps. 

Officials are also testing five free apps to assist people with disabilities, such as NaviLens, which provides sign information in audio for visually impaired people. This new technology is a great first step in laying the groundwork for a more accessible future of public transportation in New York City.

“I would like to see them do more,” said Grief. “There are areas that need to be a little clearer and colors that need to be a little brighter. The screen that they have there is a start. I have to thank Andy Byford again because he started focusing on accessibility with knowledge.”

For prospective students at King’s with a disability, there is still work to be done to make the transportation system in New York City accessible for everyone to use. 

While King’s is not presently able to be everyone’s campus, at least comfortably, the groundwork is being laid for a more accessible future.

Drew Richardson is a contributor to the Empire State Tribune. He is a senior majoring in Journalism, Culture and Society and Business Management. He serves as the Production Intern at CNBC’s “Closing Bell: Overtime” show. This article originally ran at the EST this spring.

TKC Alumni Feature: Meet Michael Sheetz, The Space Reporter Who Also Surfs

On a recent Friday afternoon, Michael Sheetz hopped on a video call as he sat in the backyard of a modest French house. 

Calling from France, specifically Chinon in the Loire valley, to New York means he is six hours ahead and is enjoying the early evening with relatives. He had just finished covering a two-week-long space conference in France, and he and his wife decided to visit family there before heading back to the States. Though extremely busy, he made an effort to join the call. 

Potted plants and vine branches fill the backyard. Clouds cover the sky, but they don’t cast a feeling of gloom. Sheetz, wearing a simple gray shirt and a silver watch, brushed back his dark brown hair and clinched his scruffy jaw as he proceeded to answer question after question about his life back in America. 

As a California kid, Sheetz dreamed of places like New York City, Paris and outer space. Now a space reporter for global business news leader CNBC, his job encapsulates all those things. 

Growing up in Orange County, Calif., Sheetz had a normal childhood filled with baseball, surfing the Pacific and debate competitions. At a young age, Sheetz  subscribed to The Wall Street Journal and slowly became a news junky. He felt like he never fully appreciated his comfortable lifestyle in California until he moved across the country for college. 

Receiving the Founders Award, a full-ride scholarship to The King’s College, Sheetz moved to New York City in the fall of 2013, majoring in Politics, Philosophy and Economics with a minor in Journalism. 

“If there is any place I’m going to get exposure to what being a journalist looks like and being around other journalists, that's where I’m gonna have to be,” he said. 

While at King’s, Sheetz took a few journalism classes and was encouraged by professors to explore the realm of business journalism. 

“Michael is a smart, talented, articulate guy who was an enthusiastic part of the King’s community and journalism program,” a journalism professor at King’s, Paul Glader, said. “He dedicated himself to journalism and business reporting and is seeing great results.” 

During college, he took up three different internships at CNBC – working in breaking news for CNBC.com, on the TV assignment desk and the production team on the show “Mad Money with Jim Cramer.” He described working there as drinking from a fire hose of daily information.

Since he lived in the city, Sheetz took a bus to Englewood Cliffs, N.J., to his job at CNBC throughout college. 

Along with those internships, he served as editor-in-chief of the school newspaper, the Empire State Tribune, and worked there all four years of college. 

After graduating in 2017, Sheetz worked full-time for CNBC.com's markets team. He stayed due to the supportive culture of the company. 

As he began to gain more experience in journalism and reporting, he started to pull a few threads that would begin to unravel his future career opportunities. 

“Instead of trying to follow along with what everyone else was doing, I wanted to find something that no one was covering, that my editors were interested in, and something that I could really own,” Sheetz said. “I loved the idea that companies are made up of individuals and everyone from the janitor up to the CEO all make decisions that are personal to them through their own knowledge and experiences.” 

Sheetz always assumed that he would head back to the west coast to write for a newspaper after putting in his four years of college but realized his new passion would best thrive in the world’s financial capital. 

“Being in New York, you’re surrounded by Wall Street and all these big financial institutions. I loved the idea of trying to tell a little bit of the people’s stories behind all that money,” he said. 

Still looking for that specific thing Sheetz could call his own, he asked his editor if he could cover SpaceX launches that were happening over the weekend. He quickly realized that this $470 billion industry was not getting enough coverage. 

“[There is this] substantial existing industry where new companies created in the last 20 years are changing the game, some of them backed by billionaires like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos and no one here is writing about it,” Sheetz said. 

He continued to pitch space stories to his editors and started covering the beat full-time. 

Though space is a broad topic, Sheetz focuses explicitly on the business and investing side. 

“It is a growing and changing beat. And today, I can hardly write about everything that is happening; there are so many companies newly public,” Sheetz said. 

Now, having over 170,000 followers on Twitter and launching a weekly newsletter, Investing in Space, Sheetz has pulled in an audience interested in space news. Though he has attended a fair share of rocket launches and space conferences, since working on the space beat full-time, Sheetz worked from home during the pandemic before returning to the office this fall.

For him, a typical day of work looks like sifting through hundreds of emails. He might watch a rocket launch webcast or tune into a press conference from NASA while writing articles.

“[Until recently], my entire existence of being a full-time space writer has been from a work-home environment,” Sheetz said.

Since he works as the news cycle requires, he has the flexibility to go back to his California roots.

Sheetz drives to Rockaway Beach in Queens a couple of times weekly to surf. But the news doesn’t stop just for him. At dawn, he packs up his surfing gear and also his laptop. After a couple of hours of catching some Atlantic ocean waves, he’ll head home or to the office – always ready for a call in case news breaks on his way.

The first paycheck he got at CNBC, he used to buy a fish surfboard. He now owns four; two fish surfboards and two shortboards. As the saying goes, you can take the boy out of California, but you can’t take California out of the boy. 

“I found a passion for using my free time to disconnect and stay offline and use that as an opportunity to recharge,” he added.

Sheetz and his wife, Joy, also a King’s alumna, have maintained a tight-knit group of college friends they often see on the weekends. 

“I have a great community of King’s alum that I’m close with; we have really stuck together in the Brooklyn area since then,” Sheetz said. 

“Michael has always shown up. Whether in high school to win national championships or to volunteer at church, he’s done so with excellence and a smile on his face,” Iain Coston, a friend of Sheetz, said. “Seeing him excel and shine at CNBC, lead new initiatives, and get hugs from Shaq is no surprise to me.” 

Now that the pandemic has subsided, Sheetz has returned to the office on a hybrid schedule, though he has enjoyed working from home.

Since international travel has loosened restrictions, CNBC deployed Sheetz to cover two exclusive space conferences in the South of France, World Satellite Business Week and the International Astronautical Congress (IAC).

Though Sheetz does not often travel for work, he could not miss the opportunity that two space conferences would be happening in the same city back to back. Sheetz moderated panels, interviewed many attendees and covered both conferences. 

But being a beat reporter is not always so glamorous. It's tough. Journalists are always in a competitive environment, wondering who will get the first exclusive or intel on the latest news. You have to be constantly on. 

“Overcoming the guilt of missing a story. Getting beat on a scoop or someone else getting an exclusive that I wanted,” Sheetz said. “I’m not omniscient. I can’t control the news; it doesn’t all flow through me. Which is what it feels like it should be.” 

Among many of his accomplishments, Sheetz started something at CNBC that no one else had attempted to take on full time.

“[My greatest accomplishment has been] building a beat from scratch. I didn’t invent space reporting, but no one was doing it full-time at CNBC,” Sheetz said. “That has been insanely satisfying. Having something that I built up, all the way to having a personal brand in space, to having CNBC be known for its space reporting.”

This article has been republished courtesy of The Empire State Tribune, the independent student newspaper at The King’s College in New York.

MPJI Sponsors Author Q&A Event For Launch of Prof. Clemente Lisi's World Cup Book

Prof. Clemente Lisi recently wrote a book titled “The FIFA World Cup: A History of the Planet's Biggest Sporting Event.” The book was released on Oct. 12, a month before the official launch of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar on Nov. 20.

The Empire State Tribune, the independent student-run campus newspaper at The King’s College, sent Campus Editor Melinda Huspen to chat with Lisi about his new book, the World Cup and his time covering this global game of soccer.

Melinda Huspen: In one or two sentences, what is the book about?

Clemente Lisi: The book is about the history of the World Cup, which started in 1930. It’s also a bit of a preview of the next World Cup, which is going to be happening in Qatar on November 20. It gives a history of all the games, the key players and some behind the scenes that a lot of people around the world know about because they've been watching the World Cup for generations. American audiences, however, are fairly new to the World Cup. I think most Americans have probably been interested for the last three or four generations, so it gives a lot of that history ahead of time and full context into what the tournament is about.

Huspen: How long have you been working on this particular book?

Lisi: My publisher came to me a little over two years ago, so this has been a two-year process. Writing a book is a lot of work. It took a lot of research and going back to my own notes, as I've covered the last three World Cups as a freelance writer myself. The research took about a year, and then the rest of it was spent writing. I was on a pretty aggressive schedule at that point, the book had to come out in October because the World Cup was in November. I had to give it to them by June. I was basically writing a chapter a month and I had to keep by that schedule. Now, the one thing that was in my favor at the time was it was the middle of the pandemic. Researching the book was harder, but you learn a lot about using online sources and online libraries. You also have the time to write it because there's nothing else to do. I could do six to seven hours a day in the summer months to write the book.

Huspen: This isn't the first book you've written on the World Cup specifically, correct?

Lisi: Yes, and that was part of the issue. I've written books about the U.S. Men's National Team, the U.S. Women's National Team and the World Cup in the past. When a publisher came to me and said, “we want a whole new book with a whole new sort of tone,” I thought, “Well, how am I going to tackle a subject that I've sort of tackled already in many different ways? This book is heavily researched in a way that I wasn't able to do in the past. I think that's because teaching for the past five years and being in the academic world has sort of taught me more about what it's like to do research and use research tools like an academic would. I approached the first half of the book like an academic, and the second half of the book I approached more like a journalist because those World Cups happened in my memory, and the last three I attended. I wrote it as if to take the reader there in a way that we never did before. The other difference between this project and the other projects that I worked on was that the publisher was really adamant about being objective about the World Cup itself, and more importantly how FIFA [Federation Internationale de Football Association] as an organization is run. I have no qualms about saying that FIFA is one of the most corrupt organizations on the planet. The book makes clear, especially in the last few chapters, about the sort of seedy nature of awarding the World Cup and some of the financial wrongdoing that happened.

Huspen: How did you approach writing about the big FIFA corruption case? How does your efforts in covering it either expand on or differ from the coverage at the time?

Lisi: It's funny, because at the time I was working at ABC News and we were covering it aggressively. The financial wrongdoing case was in 2015, when the US Justice Department got involved and a bunch of FIFA officials got arrested. They really blew a big hole into what a lot of people already knew, which was that FIFA is a corrupt organization with a lot of money laundering and a lot of scandals involving tickets. FIFA as an organization has no policing, it's all self governed, it's located in Switzerland so there's no oversight and it’s very easy for people to basically use it as an ATM machine.The World Cup is a huge generator of revenue for them, which made it a perfect storm until the US government got involved because some of the financial dealings at some of the banks were located in Florida. That gave the US Justice Department the opportunity to say, “It’s on US soil, so we can investigate this. I have lots of memories of covering that event, being an editor at ABC when it was a big thing. I have all the legal paperwork, legal documents and press releases. I thought that this was an opportunity, since I'm doing a definitive book on the history of the tournament, to really go into detail. The thing I found difficult was that if you're doing this research, you have to go to 15 different sources to try to piece together a timeline of what happened. It's hard to keep track of all these characters, so I really focused on just a few. My goal was to basically condense it all into one source.

Huspen: When and how did you start covering the World Cup?

Lisi: I started watching the World Cup when I was five years old. In 1982, Italy won the World Cup and I happened to be on vacation with my family there. My family is from Italy. Even as a five or six year old, the passion that this sport evokes in people was very impressionable when you're that little. Maybe deep down I wanted to be a soccer player; I played as a kid but wasn't good enough at it to get very far. But I did the next best thing, which was write about it and get to travel around the world and watch it. I watched soccer in general and the World Cup all throughout my life, but it wasn't till 2010 that I started to work on it. You know, I think deep down I always wanted to be a sports writer too. It just never worked out for me, though, as I usually ended up covering news and other things. As a freelancer, though, I thought, “Oh, this would be fun to cover.” I got lucky in 2010 to actually be able to go to South Africa and cover the World Cup that year. That was my first and so far only time in Africa, and it was just an amazing experience. It wasn’t just because the World Cup was fun and soccer is a great sport, but also because of the whole culture around it. Being in a place I'd never would have been before, I got to see things and meet people I never would have met otherwise. I thought, “Every four years I have to make it a point to get to the World Cup one way or another. In 2014, I went to Brazil, and in 2018 I was in Russia. At that point I was already working at King’s. I'll also be able to go to Qatar for the final week of this World Cup, so I'm looking forward to that. I’ve never been to the Middle East either. It's an opportunity to meet lots of people and eat lots of food that I wouldn't normally eat, getting a new cultural experience.

Huspen: In the title of the book you call the World Cup the planet's biggest sporting event. Why do you make that claim?

Lisi: Yeah, I get a lot of pushback on that. The World Cup is the biggest sporting event just in terms of eyeballs. I think a billion people watched the World Cup Final four years ago between France and Croatia. Even the Olympics, a global event with lots of different sports, doesn't compare in numbers. The Super Bowl for sure doesn't get there. It's in the millions, obviously, but it's mostly just the United States or North America. That's why I make that claim, and I have the numbers to back it up. I think a lot of American sports fans are like, “This is not the biggest thing in the world,” but it is.

Huspen: What kind of cultural imprint has the World Cup left both inside and outside of the soccer and sporting world?

Lisi: Two things: first, if you've ever been in another country during the World Cup, you know that everything stops. It's a little bit like how Americans watch March Madness basketball; for like two, three weeks, almost no one is doing any real work and they're just watching basketball all day. That's what happens with the World Cup for a whole month. Everyone is just basically watching soccer on television. If you go to Brazil or Italy or Spain or any of these countries where soccer is a big deal, you'll see it firsthand. Second, it gives other people other countries an excuse to be nationalistic. Nationalism is kind of a bad word in a lot of places, particularly in Europe where it's tied to Nazi Germany or fascist Italy. This is an outlet for people in Germany to say, “I cheer for Germany because this is my soccer team” or “I cheer for Italy” in places where nationalism is a bad word. I think soccer is a good excuse for people to be proud of their country. If you meet any Brazilians or Argentines, they identify primarily with their soccer players and their soccer team, not with their politics or other cultural institutions, because that's what people know them for. It’s a sense of pride for a lot of people, and increasingly in America that's becoming the case too. I think that when the World Cup starts, people in the US will be very interested in watching the U.S. team.

Huspen: Do you call the sport in your book soccer or football?

Lisi: I call it soccer in the book because that's what Americans call it. I know that the rest of the English speaking world calls it football, but I also know why we don't call it football because we would confuse the heck out of people who are watching the NFL because we call that football too. What I dislike is when Americans start using English words to talk about soccer. They'll say football, which doesn't doesn't bother me as much, but then they’ll say “pitch” instead of “field” or use all these other British terms. Just say “soccer field,” we're not in England. I know England invented soccer, but they don't have a monopoly on the language of soccer. That's kind of my pet peeve, if you will.

Huspen: Is the goal to reach more of an American audience with that kind of decision in the book?

Lisi: Yes. It's kind of twofold; to reach more of an American audience, but also at the same time reach a global audience. I don't give more time in the book to the United States national team than with any other national teams. I try to be even-handed and give attention to the teams that are successful.

Huspen: How did you write the preview of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar if it hasn't happened yet?

Lisi: That was definitely hard, because I had to have it in by June and not every nation had qualified yet. The way I previewed it was to write about Qatar in general, answering questions like: What is this country like? How did they get the World Cup? Why is it being held here? Then I just did a snapshot of the teams that I thought were going to be competitive and that had already qualified. I think I did 10 in total. I went off on a lark and told my publisher, “I'm going to write about teams like Argentina, Brazil, Denmark, Qatar, Germany and the United States, because these countries have qualified and they might be halfway decent at the World Cup. I wish I had up until now to do it, but the deal with publishing as people may know is you have to have the book to them by a certain time. It goes through an extensive copy editing and fact checking process. I'm really thankful to my editors. They were great. That process went from June, July and then you have to get the book printers and publish it and all that takes time. At some point this was the final draft and I just had to let it go and keep my fingers crossed and hope for the best and that was it. I didn't write anything that I thought couldn't happen, because in journalism, you don't do that. You can't predict the future and write about things hoping they will happen. Ultimately the chapter on Qatar is very much just about the country itself and how strange it is to have a World Cup in November when it's 100 degrees, along with all the geopolitical FIFA mess around that decision.

Huspen: Is it usually held in November?

Lisi: No, it's usually held in June or July every four years. Because Qatar got the World Cup under some dubious circumstances, they then realized only after the fact that in the summer it's 120 degrees there and just too hot to host. So they'll be hosting in November when it's a better 85 degrees. It actually disrupts the entire soccer calendar, because between August and May there's domestic soccer leagues around Europe. The Premier League and all these other competitions are being held during that time. Everyone has to take a month break in the middle of their domestic seasons to accommodate this tournament, and then go back to playing domestically again. What will also happen is these really weird situations where you're watching the World Cup on Thanksgiving weekend, which has never happened before. On Black Friday, the United States is playing England. That'll be a huge game, and people are often off work that day unlike in the rest of the month. Instead of shopping, they can stay home and watch the World Cup. I think that game might end up becoming the highest rated game in American history because people are home for Thanksgiving and the US/England game is going to be really big here.

Huspen: When did the book officially launch and how are you advertising it?

Lisi: The book came out October 12, and marketing the book is a lot easier in an internet world where you have Twitter and Instagram. I've been interviewed by a lot of podcasts already and have tried to do a lot of appearances like this one. It's been fun, even though I don't love talking about myself that much to be honest. It's a necessary evil to publicize the book and sell copies. There was an excerpt that ran in Religion Unplugged recently as well. I'm hoping to get excerpts of the book to run in other places as well, as that gets people interested in buying the book.

This interview was published with permission from the Empire State Tribune.

Prof. Clemente Lisi to release new book on the history of the FIFA World Cup ahead of Qatar 2022

A new book on the history of soccer’s World Cup, written by The King’s College journalism professor and veteran journalist Clemente Lisi, will be released on Oct. 12.

The publication of the book, “The FIFA World Cup: A History of the Planet’s Biggest Sporting Event,” comes ahead of the 2022 World Cup finals in Qatar. The quadrennial championship — the first time that it will take place in the Middle East — kicks off on Nov. 20 when the host nation takes on Ecuador.

“The World Cup is the biggest sporting event on the planet in terms of both eyeballs and passion,” Lisi said. “This book details the history of the event, the emotion it evokes and offers up a preview of the upcoming tournament.”

Every four years, the world’s best national soccer teams compete for the FIFA World Cup. Billions of people tune in from around the world to experience the remarkable events unfolding live, both on and off the field. From Diego Maradona’s first goal against England at the 1986 World Cup to Nelson Mandela’s surprise appearance at the 2010 final in South Africa, these unforgettable moments have helped to create a global phenomenon.

In “The FIFA World Cup: A History of the Planet's Biggest Sporting Event,” Lisi chronicles the 92-year-old tournament from 1930 to today. He provides vivid accounts of games, details the innovations that impacted the sport across the decades and offers biographical sketches of all-time greats such as Pele, Maradona and Lionel Messi. In addition, Lisi includes needed, objective coverage of off-field controversies such as the FIFA corruption case, making this book an impartial history of the tournament.

Featuring stunning color photography, interviews and behind-the-scenes stories from the author’s many years covering the game and attending the last three World Cups, the book is the definitive history of this global event.

The book’s official launch will take place at The King’s College in New York City on Nov. 2. Details for that event will be made public later this fall.

“The FIFA World Cup: A History of the Planet's Biggest Sporting Event” is published by Rowman and Littlefield. It is available now for preorder at Rowman.com, Barnes & Nobles, Target, Amazon and wherever books are sold.

Media who want to request a review copy can do so here.

Editorial Reviews for “The FIFA World Cup: A History of the Planet’s Biggest Sporting Event”:

“Read this book! A masterful, must-read guide full of important well-researched information for those of us who want more history and context to better enjoy and understand the World Cup.”

— Steven G. Mandis, author of “The Real Madrid Way and What Happened to the USMNT”

“Clemente Lisi's new book, The FIFA World Cup, serves as a wonderful walk down memory lane for fans of the beautiful game's biggest event. Lisi fell in love with the World Cup watching the '82 tournament at his grandmother's apartment in Italy. I fell in love with the World Cup that same summer watching the epic Germany-France semifinal shootout with my grandparents in Germany. Millions of us have similar stories to tell. Lisi's passion for the World Cup comes shining through in his well-researched, entertaining book, perfect for both die-hards and casual fans alike.”

— Andy Clayton, Deputy Sports Editor, New York Daily News

“Clemente Lisi's lifelong passion for soccer shines through on every page. The book is a great resource for novice and expert readers alike. The World Cup is the rare sports event that even non-fans can unite around and with this book he has found the back of the net.”

— Dan Good, author, “Playing Through the Pain: Ken Caminiti and the Steroids Confession That Changed Baseball Forever”

“The World Cup is unique and, with every succeeding tournament, the task of encompassing its goals and own goals, heroes and villains, magic and muddles becomes ever more of a challenge. Lisi has met that daunting test full-on and with an enthusiasm and love of the game which breathes through every page to render this a worthy addition to the genre.”

— Keir Radnedge, best-selling sports author, long-time columnist and former editor of World Soccer magazine

Paige Hagy elected King's SPJ chapter president for the 2022-23 academic year

Paige Hagy, outgoing editor-in-chief of the Empire State Tribune, has been elected president of the student chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists at The King’s College for the 2022-23 academic year. Hagy replaces current president Sofia Valdes.  

In addition to her new position, Hagy will be interning this summer at American Banker through the Dow Jones News Fund.

Chapter members also elected Valdes the chapter’s vice president and Melinda Huspen as secretary. Both students have also worked for the EST, the award-winning independent student newspaper at King’s. 

In addition to electing a new executive team, the chapter co-sponsored a series of events with MPJI this year. The chapter helped co-sponsor and promote “Alumni Night” in the fall and spring semesters, where King’s and NYCJ alums discuss what it was like to work in the news media during the pandemic.  

The highlight of the year was a talk on April 13 by publisher Walter E. Hussman Jr., which served as MPJI’s eight annual lecture and co-sponsored by the chapter. 

The campus SPJ chapter was founded by students in 2018. Past chapter presidents have been Anastassia Gliadkovskaya (2018-19), Jillian Cheney (2019-20) and Gabriela Kressley (2020-21).  

The Society of Professional Journalists is the nation’s most broad-based journalism organization, dedicated to encouraging the free practice of journalism and stimulating high standards of ethical behavior.

SPJ, founded in 1909 as Sigma Delta Chi, promotes the free flow of information vital to a well-informed citizenry through the daily work of its members. The organization works to educate current and future journalists through professional development and protects First Amendment guarantees of freedom of press and speech through its advocacy efforts.

For more information on how to become a member, please visit www.spj.org or fill out the application form here.

Spring ‘22 NYCJ students learn what it takes to make it in New York, studying and interning in the city as the pandemic eases

Students taking part in the NYC Semester in Journalism program have spent the past two months covering important local and national news stories as the world slowly emerges from COVID-19. 

This semester’s students followed in the footsteps of past NYCJ classes by participating in the unique semester-long, off-campus study program operated by the McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute at The King’s College in NYC.

After two years when internships were remote, many are now hybrid while classes at King’s are back in person. 

“I would absolutely recommend NYCJ to anybody who thinks journalism may be a career they pursue seriously,” said Banks Halvorson, who hails from Covenant College in Georgia and is currently interning at the Brooklyn Paper.

“The experience of working with newspapers in the media capital of America is priceless, and the classes you take and people you meet are incredible. I was excited about this program, but it has blown all my expectations out of the water.”  

Students taking part in the 14th NYCJ cohort that chose to make New York their home this semester. The students are enrolled in classes, including History of Journalism and New York City with Prof. Clemente Lisi and Entrepreneurial Journalism with Prof. Paul Glader. Under Glader’s guidance, the students work 20 hours per week in a New York newsroom, earning six academic credits and pursuing bylines.

Paige Taylor, a student from Abilene Christian University in Texas, is currently an intern at Bold TV. She said her internship and courses — in addition to living in New York City — has made this semester a unique experience.  

“Living and working in New York is much more fast paced than I anticipated,” she added, “but I adapted very quickly and have actually grown to love the hustle and bustle.” 

Esther Wickham, a King’s student who is taking part in NYCJ this spring, said her internship at amNewYork and living in the city has given her a chance to gain valuable experience needed for her to get a job once she graduates. 

“I would definitely recommend the program! It grants you the opportunity that the current college you attend can't give you,” she said. “Living in New York City during your college years while pursuing a career in journalism with highly skilled and talented professors that have been in the journalism field for decades is a dream many have.” 

Camila da Silva, a student who attends the Sao Paulo-based Mackenzie Presbyterian University in Brazil, is spending the semester as an intern with Religion Unplugged. She said her favorite class was History of Journalism, a course that looks at coverage of various events in U.S. history, including the 9/11 attacks, and the beliefs, values and character that goes with working in a New York newsroom.

“It brings together what we can learn from the past and perspectives for building modern journalism,” she said. 

Both Taylor and Wickham are taking Religion Reporting this semester, giving students yet another chance to get bylines since the advanced reporting class works closely with ReligionUnplugged.com. The non-profit religion news website, which has offices at TKC, is part of The Media Project. 

“We have gone really in depth on reporting and getting outside of our comfort zone when it comes to reporting on topics we are not very familiar with,” Taylor said. “I have learned so much about reporting.” 

The New York City Semester program partners with more than 41 universities and colleges across the U.S. and the world. Students can apply to join the program for a future semester by clicking here. 

Politico Editor Peter Canellos Explores The Moral Formation Of An American Hero For Equality

This article was originally published on Religion Unplugged on January 21, 2022.

John Marshall Harlan. Photo via Mathew Brady or Levin Handy — Brady-Handy Photograph Collection (Library of Congress).

(REVIEW) When former President Rutherford B. Hayes appointed John Marshall Harlan to the Supreme Court in 1877, anti-slavery Republicans mistrusted him, calling him “the sycophantic friend and suppliant tool” of White supremacists. Harlan had been born into a slaveholding family in 1833, and he was the lone Southerner on the court. 

To the surprise of his critics, Justice Harlan turned out to be the sole defender of civil rights in a series of Supreme Court cases that sharply limited the scope of the civil rights of Black Americans. Today, we read Harlan’s dissents as authoritative interpretations of the Constitution, and we repudiate the racist logic of many of the decisions of Harlan’s judicial contemporaries. How did Harlan get so much right at a time when his colleagues were getting so much wrong? 

At an online book talk organized by the King’s College in New York, Politico editor Peter Canellos said that his interest in the life of John Marshall Harlan was a “search for the roots of wisdom in the law.” 

“What makes Harlan wise in the estimation of history?” Canellos asked. “What made his colleagues unwise?” 

Peter Canellos

Canellos has a law degree from Columbia University, and he covered the nominations of Samuel Alito and John Roberts to the Supreme Court for The Boston Globe. His legal and journalistic training have equipped him to write “The Great Dissenter,” an engaging, popular and accessible book on Harlan and his jurisprudence. 

Canellos said that Harlan’s distinctive value system lay behind the differences between Harlan and his colleagues on the court. Harlan was a deeply religious man who served as an elder in the Presbyterian church, and he brought to his work a conviction that he was tasked with doing God’s will on Earth. He was not afraid to stand as a lone dissenter in cases to which he perceived his colleagues to be morally blind. In a letter to Harlan, Frederick Douglass wrote, “One man with God is a majority.”

A second source of Harlan’s moral courage was his commitment to the ideals of the Founding Fathers. American democracy was a great experiment in a world full of monarchs and authoritarians. He felt the wisdom of the Founding Fathers akin to a secular religion. He believed that a court that lived up to the spirit of America’s founding documents would ensure that all people who lived under the American flag were treated equally before the law. 

A third source of Harlan’s morality was his personal experience. He grew up in a family steeped in reverence for the law. He was the son of a prominent Kentucky lawyer and politician, and his father groomed him early in life to follow in his footsteps. John had a probable Black half-brother, Robert Harlan, whom his father brought up as a member of the family. In the face of Promethean odds, Robert thrived as a businessman, entrepreneur, politician and philanthropist. John’s relationship with Robert inoculated John from internalizing prevailing cultural concepts of Black inferiority. 

The Great Dissenter

Peter Canelloss, “The Great Dissenter,” Simon and Schuster, 2021.

In the civil rights cases of 1883, Harlan broke with his colleagues when the court ruled that the 14th Amendment applied only to the actions of state governments. In his dissenting opinion, Harlan argued that business owners who perform public functions should be subject to Congress’ power to enforce the 14th Amendment.

Harlan wrote his dissenting opinion using the inkwell with which former Chief Justice Roger Taney wrote Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) — a case that Harlan considered to be America’s original judicial sin. It appalled Harlan that the same court that upheld Congress’ power to force private individuals to turn over runaway slaves in Dred Scot would now deny Congress’ power to prevent racial discrimination against freed men and women in places of public accommodation.  

In Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), eight Supreme Court justices set up the legal structure for Jim Crow by upholding a Louisiana law that mandated separate railroad cars for Black customers. In his dissent, Harlan wrote, “In the eyes of the law, there is no superior, dominant ruling class of citizens in this country. There is no caste here. Our Constitution is color blind and does not know or tolerate classes among its citizens.”  

Peter Canelloss, “The Great Dissenter,” Simon and Schuster, 2021.

In 1906, Harlan intervened in the case of Ed Johnson, a Black man from Kentucky who was convicted of raping a White woman at night in a cemetery even though the victim testified that she wasn’t sure her assailant was Black. Harlan ordered a stay of Johnson’s execution.

A White mob responded to Harlan’s ruling by descending on Chattanooga’s jail and dragging Johnson from his cell. The mob murdered Johnson and pinned a note to his dead body, saying, “To Chief Harlan, Here is your Negro.” Harlan convinced his fellow justices to try for contempt local court officials in Chattanooga who failed to protect Johnson. This resulted in the first and only time in history that the Supreme Court functioned as a criminal trial court. 

At the height of the Gilded Age, Harlan continued his dissents. He defended legislative efforts to break up corporate monopolies, institute an income tax and protect children and other exploited workers. Harlan’s colleagues on the court were corporate lawyers whose commitment to economic freedom precluded government intervention to protect labor rights. 

In the 1901 cases on the status of U.S. territories acquired in the Spanish-American War, Harlan sought to extend full legal protections to people of newly acquired territories in Hawaii, the Philippines and Puerto Rico. He warned that the court must not treat people who live under the American flag as “subjects” or “dependent peoples” lest it “engraft on our republican institutions a colonial system … abhorrent to the principles that underlie and pervade our Constitution.” 

In Berea v. Kentucky (1908), Harlan issued one of his most anguished dissents. An abolitionist preacher had founded Berea College in 1855 to educate Black and White men and women side-by-side, in a state of biblical unity. In 1904, the Kentucky legislature passed a bill to prohibit Black and White students from attending the same institution, public or private. Berea College challenged the law, arguing that it violated its property rights and constitutional liberties. 

The Supreme Court upheld Kentucky’s prohibition as a reasonable application of the state’s police powers, citing the state’s interest in preventing racial commingling. Harlan’s dissent rang with righteous indignation. “The capacity to impart instruction to others is given by the Almighty for beneficent purposes, and its use may not be forbidden or interfered with by government,” Harlan wrote. “The right to impart instruction ... is beyond question part of one’s liberty as guaranteed … by the Constitution of the United States.”

Robert Harlan

Robert Harlan was probably the most important influence of John’s views on racial equality. Robert was 16 years older than John. In John’s eyes, Robert loomed as a fearless man of action. Robert’s refined cultural interests and entrepreneurial successes shaped John’s perceptions of what Black Americans could achieve in an atmosphere of freedom. 

Because he was African American, Robert was prevented from pursuing a formal education. Instead, he had to navigate from a young age the rough and tumble rituals of frontier life. At various times in his life, Robert succeeded as a horse racing impresario, a gold rush entrepreneur, a financier of Black businesses, a world traveler and an elected member of the Ohio House of Representatives. 

Robert opened a store in San Francisco during the California gold rush, and he returned to Kentucky with a fortune, which he invested in businesses in the free state of Ohio. Robert helped finance the first public school for Black children sanctioned by the Cincinnati school board. He also held the lease on the Duma House, a hotel that was the “beating heart of the Cincinnati Black community, honeycombed with hiding places for runaway slaves.” When John Harlan was nominated to the Supreme Court, Robert helped galvanize Republican support for his appointment. 

With his large house, fashionable clothing and biracial heritage, Robert became a representative of America’s aristocrats of color. When traveling, Robert and his influential Black friends — such as Frederick Douglass, Louisiana Governor P.B.S. Pinchback and Howard Law School founder John Mercer Langston — would stay in one another’s homes and host lavish dinners. Robert raised his children in a world of cosmopolitan sophistication, community service, political activism and appreciation for the arts. As John was resisting the legal threats to Black rights on the high court, Robert was fighting in the Ohio legislature to protect Black Americans’ access to inns, restaurants and public transportation. The New York World stated that Robert’s influence in Black America rivaled that of Douglass. 

During his lifetime, John Harlan was dismissed by many White Americans as an eccentric outlier. However, Black Americans responded enthusiastically to the justice whom they considered to be their sole ally on the Supreme Court. When Harlan died in 1911, Black congregations around the country organized spontaneous memorial services. The massive Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church in Washington hosted a multi-faith service in which Harlan’s Plessy dissent was read aloud.

“When the spirit of John Marshall Harlan left its temple of clay last Saturday morning, a great light went out,” proclaimed the Washington Bee. “An entire race, today, is weeping because ... a friend has been taken from us. ... Now that he has gone, we cannot help but tramble, and fear that no one after him may dissent against decisions against our race.”

In the 1950s, the NAACP found in Harlan’s Plessy dissent the legal basis to overturn segregation. Constance Baker Motley, who clerked for Thurgood Marshall, recalled, “Marshall would read aloud passages from Harlan’s amazing dissent. I don’t believe we ever filed a brief in which a portion of that opinion was not quoted.”

When Justice Marshall died in 1993, Judge Motley wrote, “Marshall admired the courage of Harlan more than any justice who has ever sat on the Supreme Court. Even Chief Justice Warren’s forthright and moving decision for the court in (Brown v. Board of Education) did not affect Marshall in the same way. Earl Warren was writing for a unanimous Supreme Court. Harlan was a solitary and lonely figure writing for posterity.”

Robert Carle is a professor at the King’s College in Manhattan. Dr. Carle has contributed to The Wall Street Journal, The American Interest, Religion Unplugged, Newsday, Society, Human Rights Review, Academic Questions, and Reason. Some of the material in this essay was published in The Public Discourse on July 13, 2021.

MPJI August 2021 Letter To Friends, Donors, Students and Alums

Dear Friends of MPJI,

Greetings from New York City, where tourism, commerce and culture are rapidly returning post-pandemic. At MPJI, we are excited about: 

NYCJ: A full class of 13 students attending the NYC Semester in Journalism (NYCJ) program this fall, bringing diverse backgrounds and perspectives from across the U.S. (and one from Brazil). We are placing these students in newsroom internships including AM New York, Brooklyn Paper, Newsweek and Bold TV. If your newsroom wants an intern now or in a future semester, please do reach out!

Fall 2021 Class of NYCJ Students

Summer Academy: Our Summer Academy high school journalism program enrolled 17 students across two tracks: Arts and Culture reporting with Prof Paul Glader and Sports reporting with Prof Clemente Lisi July 26-30. We had a great week!

Summer Academy 2021 students

JCS: We look forward to welcoming our Journalism, Culture and Society (JCS) four-year majors back on campus in a matter of days. We are excited about strong and diverse leadership teams at The Empire State Tribune campus news outlet and in our on-campus chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists led by its new president Sofia Valdes.

Advisers & Friends: We are delighted to welcome a few new names to our MPJI advisory committee: Jordan Ritter Conn, Dr. Anne Hendershott, Hamil Harris, Jerry Mitchell, Brandon Mercer, Bobby Ross, Meagan Clark, Hope Hodge Seck and Michael Goodwin. Congratulations to Marshall Allen for his new book “Never Pay The First Bill” published by Portfolio / Penguin (where it was edited by Bria Sanford, another advisory committee member). And congratulations to Nathan Pyle for his best-selling books, “Existence Chronicle,” “Strange Planet, "Stranger Planet.” Also, our adjunct colleague Stephen Kurczy, who teaches media law and ethics to our JCS majors, has a new book out with Dey St. press titled “The Quiet Zone: Unraveling the mystery of a town suspended in silence.” We published a QnA with Annie Augustine, who worked in PR at The Atlantic, The New Republic and Vice News before teaching an elective class in media PR at King’s.

Congratulations to our ALUMS doing great work. Here are a few updates:

• Lydia Moynihan covers Wall Street for The New York Post, recently switching to that role from her job as a producer at Fox Business.

• Bernadette Berdychowski is a retail and real estate reporter at The Tampa Bay Times, recently switching from her role in audience development.

• Morgan Chittum is a finance reporter at blockchain news outlet Blockworks, after her year as a fellow at the New York Daily News.

• Wesley Parnell has published some enterprise pieces in addition to his daily coverage as a metro reporter and photojournalist at New York Daily News.

• Anastassia Gliadkovskaya is a staff writer at Fierce Healthcare after interning this spring at Forbes.com.

• Michael Sheetz was all over the summer billionaire space jam in his job as space reporter at CNBC.

• Jessica Mathews joins Fortune magazine as a finance reporter, after three years at FinancialPlanning. Her fellow TKC alumna, Anne Sraders, has been a finance reporter at Fortune for two years.

• Kat Samelson is a production assistant at the Today Show.

• Zoe Jones is working at CBS News.

• Elissa Esher is a digital producer at Hearst.

• Maria Monteros is associate editor for retail at IndustryDive.

• Hope Hodge Seck is managing editor at Military.com.

• Rachel Greenland is a research editor and analyst at Boardroom Insiders.

• Mitch Chamberlain and Amy Chamberlain, who met in the NYCJ program in 2016, got married and had twins!

• Sydney Franklin, an alum of NYCJ forerunner WJC, completed her year-long fellowship at The New York Times on the real estate desk.

• Callie Patteson joined The New York Post as a political reporter after nearly a year as breaking news editor at The Washington Examiner.

Events: If you missed our awesome session last fall with investigative reporter and MacArthur Grant recipient Jerry Mitchell, you canread about it and watch it here. We also posted videos and details from our spring SkepTech 2021 forum with David French, Al Sikes and others. We also posted a video of photojournalist Gary Fong’s spring 2021 MPJI lecture. Stay tuned for some exciting events this coming school year!

End Note: We were glad to hear from Det Norske Teatret in Oslo, Norway, recently about their upcoming production of The Lehman Trilogy by Sam Mendes. The organization plans to reprint (with our permission) an obituary of Robert Lehman written by John McCandlish Phillips in the theater program. Here’s the obituary: click here.

Follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook! 

We remain grateful for your friendship and support. Big THANK YOU to the Salinger Foundation for their recent annual support of scholarships for NYCJ students. If you would like to support the work of MPJI, you can make a tax-deductible donation here and specify that the donation should go to MPJI. 

Paul Glader

Director of MPJI

The McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute is a home of journalism-related programs and majors at The King’s College in New York City. In addition to its academic programs, it hosts events and provides resources to its students, alums, friends and donors. The institute is named in honor of the legendary reporter at The New York Times who was an exemplar of standards, ethics and style in the craft of journalism and was a kind friend and mentor to those of us who knew him.

MPJI Advisory Committee Member’s New Book Shows Readers How To Challenge Health Care System

Journalist and MPJI advisory committee member Marshall Allen made big moves during the Covid-19 pandemic. After a decade reporting investigative stories about health for the non-profit news outlet ProPublica, Allen joined the Office of the Inspector General at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as an assistant regional inspector general. 

Also, Marshall has a new book out from Portfolio Penguin (edited by MPJI advisory committee member Bria Sanford) titled “Never Pay the First Bill: And Other Ways to Fight the Health Care System and Win.” The book has led to many media appearances and speaking events in recent months. 

Marshall's worked as a Christian missionary in Kenya and attended Fuller Seminary before getting into journalism and investigative reporting. He has inspired hundreds of our students. And the MPJI lecture Marshall gave in 2016, was also edited into an opinion piece that ran in the Sunday Review section of The New York Times. MJPI executive director Paul Glader caught up with Marshall about his book and his new job. We remain grateful for his speaking and mentorship with our students in the past eight years.

Q: Hi Marshall, tell us about your new job and why you made the switch? Should we miss your bylines about outrageous practices in the health care industry? How does the new job align with your previous work?

My new job with the federal government utilizes my skillset as my investigative reporter, but in a different context. Now I have much greater access to data, interview subjects and other information, as I evaluate and inspect taxpayer-funded government health care programs and their role serving the public. I’ll still be reporting and writing and editing, but instead of stories my team and I will publish government reports that include recommendations for improvements. 

I won’t be writing for ProPublica, but I’m pleased that my new job allows me to continue the work as an author and educator. My book has had a successful launch and now I’m working on launching a curriculum of health literacy videos that are based on the book. My goal is to pair the book and videos together so American can be equipped and empowered to get a better deal on health care. The content shows people how to check their medical bills for inaccuracies and overcharges; win insurance company appeals; avoid unnecessary treatment and more. If people want to learn more about the health literacy videos, I just launched an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign to complete their production. Please partner with me to bring them to life! I will also be writing more for my own website, marshallallen.com, and publishing Victory Stories – examples of individuals and employers finding ways to get the health care they need at a lower price, or fighting the system and winning. 

Q: So tell us about this book. What’s your main thesis? 

“Never Pay the First Bill” is a how-to guide to help individuals and employers hack the health care system. My main thesis is that the health care system has been preying on us financially, but with the right tactics we can save hundreds or even thousands of dollars per health care interaction – without compromising the care that we need. Americans pay twice as much per person for health care compared to the citizens of other developed nations. Plus, we still have about 30 million people who are uninsured. And our outcomes are much worse! 

Our ridiculous health care costs are not justified. Often they are driven up by middlemen who are marking up the cost of medicine so they can make money. There’s a lot of profiteering in the industry and it’s costing us. Working Americans and employers are the hardest hit by our country’s out-of-control health care costs. They are paying much more than they should because of billing errors, overcharges, unnecessary treatment, unjustified prices and more. 

My book boosts people’s health care financial literacy so they can avoid the costly pitfalls that surround them in the health care system. I’m already seeing people save big money by putting the tactics in the book into practice. It’s been really rewarding to see people equipped and empowered and standing up for themselves and winning. 

Q: It sounds revolutionary in some ways to empower people to challenge big corporations in this manner. Do you feel like a lonely voice in this cause or do you sense the revolution is being televised and picking up steam? 

This movement is definitely picking up steam. People know they’re being exploited financially by the health care system. Americans say year after year that the high cost of health care is their number one financial concern. It’s so bad now that about 1 in every 5 Americans has medical debt in collections! The health care system has pushed our backs against the wall and individuals and employers are ready to try new things. The industry is filled with so much waste, and it’s been so abusive to the public, that it is ripe for disruption. And when individuals and employers put the tactics into place that I write about in my book, they are dramatically reducing the cost of their health care, while improving the quality of the care they need. 

Q : You wrote about your own experience using these techniques with your father’s health care and you express a righteous indignation and sense of justice as people seek transparency and accountability from healthcare providers and insurers. How does your Christian faith inform this sense of justice? 

Each of us is valuable as a person because we are made in the image of God. Every person’s life is precious. So when even a single person gets ripped off by the health care system it’s a violation of what’s right and just – and causing harm to a person who is created in God’s image. In this case, every American is paying much more than they should be for the care that they need. And in many cases the costs are so high people are unable to get the care they need. 

My book’s argument is built on what’s moral and fair and ethical. Right now, what we see happening on the financial side of the health care system is legal, but it’s not ethical. For example, let’s start with the hidden prices. It’s not right to hide the price of a procedure or test from a patient at the time of service, and then hit them with a massive bill that’s many times higher than it should be. And yet, this type of overcharges are standard in our health care system. It’s also not right to raise the prices on drugs like insulin, which diabetics need to survive, without making any improvement in the drug itself. But this has also been standard practice. It’s also not right for hospitals to make billing mistakes and refuse to correct them. But this is a daily occurrence. 

The health care system doesn’t give consideration to patients who are not given prices up front, or have unfairly priced insulin, or get overcharged due to a billing mistake. Those patients get sent to collections or even sued by some hospitals. They might have their wages garnished or need to declare bankruptcy. It’s an incredibly unfair situation. 

The dirty secret, which is well known by people in the industry, is that the cost of health care does not have to be so high. Experts estimate that the system squanders about 25% of what we spend – on overcharges, administrative bloat, unnecessary treatment, our inefficient claims processing system and more. The solution is not for the health care system to keep demanding more money. The solution is for the system to make better use of our money. 

There’s a tremendous amount of moral force behind the argument I’m making in the book. I am quite simply saying that it’s not OK to cheat people and overcharge them just because they got sick. And when a person who is being exploited or overcharged stands up for themselves, they also have a tremendous amount of moral force behind their argument. And if they persist and use the right tactics there’s a good chance they will win their argument. 

Q: We appreciated that your book had specific advice for readers but also was full of data and reporting - not just how-to opining. Can you tell us about your reporting and writing methodology? 

I’m careful to make sure what I report is accurate and fair. For example, when I tell stories of patients being harmed by the health care system, I have the patient waive their privacy rights for the sake of my reporting. That way I can reach out to their hospital, insurance company and doctor, to make sure I get the full story. When things get complicated, as they often do in health care journalism, I call experts who can guide me to make sure I’m not going beyond what’s true when I write. I’m also meticulous with my fact checking. I run every detail by the subjects who are in my book to make sure I presented everything correctly, in fact and in the tone of the writing.

I’m also careful to make sure the tone of what I write is not sensationalized. I know it sounds strong for me to say our system is exploiting our sickness for profit. But I have documented this so many times and in so many ways that this is quite honestly the most accurate way to frame what is happening from the point of view of the public. I can speak with this much authority because I have investigated this industry for more than 15 years and have done my homework.  

Q: What impact do you hope and believe the book and your new job will allow you to make in coming years? 

Marshall Allen

The OIG job gives me an incredible amount of access to information and the influence to identify ways to improve the delivery of health care in our government programs. It will take me some time to learn the process, but I plan to make the most of the opportunity. With my book and video curriculum, I want to equip and empower working Americans and employers, so they can be protected about the financially predatory practices of the health care system. No one is coming to our rescue, so each of us needs to boost our health care literacy so we can protect our money and make sure we still get the care we need. It’s already happening, and I want to bring it to scale nationally. 

The McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute is a home of journalism-related programs and majors at The King’s College in New York City. In addition to its academic programs, it hosts events and provides resources to its students, alums, friends and donors. The institute is named in honor of the legendary reporter at The New York Times who was an exemplar of standards, ethics and style in the craft of journalism and was a kind friend and mentor to those of us who knew him.

The McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute welcomes the NYCJ class of Fall 2021

NEW YORK — The 13th class of the NYC Semester in Journalism arrived in late August from across the United States and one from Brazil. The class of 13 students represent nine colleges and universities. 

The students will participate in a unique semester-long, off-campus study program operated by the McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute at The King’s College in New York. They will spend the semester living in student housing at King’s, where they will engage in a journalism-intensive semester, including taking classes such as Entrepreneurial Journalism with Prof. Paul Glader, a former reporter at The Wall Street Journal and founder of VettNews.com.   

Under the guidance of both Glader and Prof. Clemente Lisi, a former editor at the New York Post, students will earn six academic credits pursuing at least one byline or video credit per week for their portfolios. 

The New York City Semester program partners with 41 colleges and universities across the nation and globe. Apply to become a partner school by contacting Paul Glader at pglader@tkc.edu. Apply to join us as a student for a future semester by clicking here. 

Here is a roster of the NYCJ Fall 2021 class: 

Leocciano Callao 

A native of The Philippines, Leocciano hails from Providence Christian College in Pasadena, Calif. He is interning at the Brooklyn Paper this semester.   
 

Anna Carlson

Anna attends Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego. She previously worked for The Point Weekly, Point Loma’s student media outlet. She is interning at Newsweek.  

Julia Findley 

A digital communication and design manager, Findey is a student at William Jessup University in Rocklin, Calif. She is interning at Bold TV.  

Alyssa Flores 

Alyssa also attends William Jessup, studying marketing and communications. She is interning at Bold TV.    

Haeven Gibbons 

A journalism major and Spanish minor, Gibbons is a student at Texas Christian University in Dallas. She previously interned at The Media Project, which is based at King’s, and is currently an intern at amNewYork.  

Ashley Grams

Ashley is a broadcast journalism major at Biola University outside Los Angeles. She is interning at NBC New York.



Nyckole Holguin 

Nyckole is a student at St. Edward’s University in Austin, Texas, studying broadcast journalism. She is interning at amNewYork.  

Alyse Messmer 

Alyse is a student at Cal Baptist University located near Los Angeles. She is interning at Newsweek.   

Katelyn Quisenberry

A student who attends Biola University outside Los Angeles, Katelyn is interning at Bold TV.   

Sofia Kioko Saleem Khan 

Sofia hails from Brazil and attends Mackenzie Presbyterian University in Sao Paulo. She is interning at Religion Unplugged, an Award-winning non-profit news website. 
 

Rebecca Schwind

Rebecca is a student at Biola University outside Los Angeles and has experience at The Chimes, the school’s student-run newspaper. She is interning at Newsweek.  

Jada Williamson 

Jada is a student at Lee University in Cleveland, Tenn. She is interning at the Brooklyn Paper.  

Kayla Wong

Kayla attends Point Loma Nazarene University. She is interning at the Queens Courier. 

The McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute is a home of journalism-related programs and majors at The King’s College in NYC. In addition to its academic programs, it hosts events and provides resources to its students, alums, friends and donors. The institute is named in the honor of the legendary reporter at The New York Times who was an exemplar of standards, ethics and style in the craft of journalism and was a kind friend and mentor to those of us who knew him.

King’s Journalism Professor Launches Acclaimed Book About Cell-Free Zone in West Virginia

Stephen Kurczy has taught media law and ethics at The King’s College since 2018 and recently released an acclaimed non-fiction book, published Aug. 3 by Dey Street Books, titled “The Quiet Zone: Unraveling the Mystery of a Town Suspended in Silence.” It has already been named one of USA Today’s five books not to miss and a Washington Post top 10 book for August. 

Kurczy spent years reporting on the town of Green Bank, West Virginia, which is a technological paradox. It’s home to the Green Bank Observatory, where astronomers “search the depths of the universe using the latest technology, while schoolchildren go without WiFi or iPads.” For the observatory’s radio telescopes to hear the faint whispers of deep space, the surrounding area must remain largely free of radio noise, which is why WiFi, smartphones, and even microwaves are banned at the observatory and discouraged in the surrounding area. Cell service is out of the question. Kurczy explores the characters and subcultures in this town. The New York Times calls the book “a reminder of the simple pleasure of reconnecting with real people in real life.” 

Kurczy graduated from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, where he was a Knight-Bagehot Fellow in Business and Economics Journalism. He has a degree in philosophy from Calvin College. He has reported from more than a dozen countries for publications ranging from The New York Times to The Christian Science Monitor. He also has functioned without a cellphone for more than a decade. MPJI executive director and JCS program chair Paul Glader asked Stephen some questions about his new book.

Q. How and why did you decide to report about Green Bank? 

I threw away my first and last cellphone in 2009. Since then, my initially trivial decision to live without a phone has escalated into an obstinate refusal to tote around a piece of technological hardware that I believe infringes on personal space, invades privacy, and erodes human capacity to focus and live in the moment. Seemingly every day, an article or piece of research is published about the downside of smartphones and how they keep us obsessively (and unhealthily) connected at all times. Yet I remain one of the few people to take the hardline response of abstaining from usage. 

In America today, 97 percent of people own cellphones and 85 percent own smartphones, according to the Pew Research Center. I’m an outlier. Is there any place where I still fit in? Is there a place where anyone can still eat dinner, watch a movie, or vacation uninterrupted by a cellphone? Those questions led me to do a simple online search for “places in the U.S. without cell service.” The top result was for a town called Green Bank in West Virginia, supposedly the “quietest town in America,” where cell service was outlawed and WiFi, smartphones, and other modern tech were reportedly banned. To me, it sounded like paradise. Within weeks, I was there.

Q. Who were some of the most interesting characters you reported on in this book? 

The book has a diverse cast. We meet one of the world’s foremost radio astronomers, who is also one of the best banjo players in Appalachia. We speak with the woman who oversees the 13,000-square-mile National Radio Quiet Zone and the man who patrols the area like a cop looking for renegade radio signals. We also interact with the other groups that have been attracted to life in a super-quiet place, including back-to-the-landers, neo-Nazis, government spies, a clown physician named Patch Adams, and a group of people who believe they’re made physically ill by cell service and WiFi. 

One of my favorite characters in the book is a drug-dealing ex-convict named De Thompson, who teaches me how to forage for ramps and takes me deep into a cave that is connected to a long-unsolved murder. He is a colorful, complicated figure, which basically sums up the area. Colorful and complicated. 

Q. Who are the “electrosensitives” that you report on in this book? 

I spent hundreds of hours over several years speaking with the area’s so-called electrosensitives, who believe they are pained to the point of debilitation from cell service, WiFi, smartphones, and almost any other kind of modern technology. Hundreds of these “WiFi refugees” have come to Green Bank from around the world looking for relief from their pain. These people are clearly suffering, though it’s unclear exactly from what. Electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) is unrecognized by the American Medical Association or the World Health Organization. 

I met one woman named Sue who moved to Green Bank from the New York City area—leaving behind her husband and kids—because she felt that living in the Quiet Zone was her only way to survive. Why would she and so many other people uproot their lives for something that wasn’t real? Their conviction brought me to see electrosensitivity as a kind of religion. Just as some people pray to Jesus and others to Muhammad to heal them, Sue essentially prays to the quiet. Who am I to say she’s wrong? And in any case, she’s a great asset to the Green Bank Observatory, as she truly believes in the area’s quiet mission.

Q. And you reported on the National Alliance, a neo-Nazi group that was once selling $1 million annually of hate materials around the world? 

As I said, the Quiet Zone is a complicated place! Along with being home to the nation’s first federal radio astronomy observatory, it’s also home to what was once the “most dangerous and best organized neo-Nazi formation in America,” according to the nonprofit Southern Poverty Law Center. The National Alliance’s founder was William Pierce, author of an infamous novel called The Turner Diaries, considered the Bible of the racist right. That book and the National Alliance have been linked to dozens of acts of racist violence over the past half-century, and it’s in part because of the evil influence that Pierce wielded from the Quiet Zone. 

In essence, the neo-Nazis came to the Quiet Zone for the same reason as the astronomers, hippies, and electrosensitives: to get away from it all in one of the last great swaths of quiet in America. Pierce took refuge on a secluded mountain where he could pursue his agenda in relative peace, without being bothered by minorities, law enforcement, or civil liberties groups. He was able to thrive in the Quiet Zone in part because of the area’s “live and let live” attitude. Such a view on racism is dangerous, as I conclude in the book, as it also allows racism to fester and eventually erupt into violence. We can’t be quiet in the face of such evil. 

Q. What’s the military’s connection to Green Bank? 

Most reports about the Quiet Zone only mention Green Bank and its famous radio astronomy observatory. But in fact, the National Radio Quiet Zone protects both Green Bank and a town called Sugar Grove, where the U.S. military has since the 1960s operated its own collection of radio antennas used for communications and surveillance. The facility is today operated by the National Security Agency (NSA), the intelligence-gathering arm of the Defense Department. Using the antennas in Sugar Grove, the NSA eavesdrops on millions of private telephone calls and emails every hour. It’s a vital part of the military’s global spy operations. And it’s made possible by the Quiet Zone. Just as Green Bank requires quiet for its telescopes to hear deep space, so does Sugar Grove require quiet to listen in on the outside world’s communications.

Q. What role did religion and houses of worship play in people’s lives and in your reporting in Green Bank? 

Green Bank sits inside the most sparsely populated county east of the Mississippi River, with about 8,200 residents spread over an area the size of Rhode Island. You can imagine how challenging it is to connect with people when they’re all so spread out, and when many were wary of speaking with an outsider like me. I had to find an inroads, and that turned out to be the houses of worship. 

The county has about three dozen active churches, which also serve as community meeting places. I felt comfortable attending them, as my father is a minister and I went to a Christian college. This was a way I could show interest in local culture and respect for locals’ beliefs. In turn, people were more willing to speak with me, invite me for dinner, and point me in the right direction as I searched for answers to what this place was all about. 

Q. Will Green Bank ever change its rules against WiFi and cell service? 

Yes, but perhaps not formally. It’s already happening with WiFi. As I found over years of reporting, WiFi has become so pervasive that it’s hard to find many homes without it, which begs the question: Is something illegal if everybody does it? I compare it to speed limits. A sign may say the limit is 65 mph, but if everybody goes 75 mph then nobody will get in trouble. Same with almost everybody having WiFi in Green Bank. 

Cell service exists as close as nine miles from the observatory, at a ski resort that installed a special low-power system of distributed antennas that allows skiers to stay connected. As such technology gets cheaper, it might become affordable for the area’s towns to consider such investments. Another new technology is low-range WiFi, which might not impact the telescopes. The observatory has also considered building a giant wall or berm around itself, which would essentially shield it from the community’s WiFi. 

The world’s growing amount of radio noise may also force Green Bank to abandon its quiet policy. The Quiet Zone is increasingly under threat from overhead communications satellites as companies such as SpaceX and Google launch plans to establish global WiFi through thousands of low-orbiting satellites. At some point, there’ll be no option but to set up a radio telescope on the far side of the moon, a place that is truly radio silent. 

Q. What kind of lessons did you find from Green Bank that most interested you and might interest readers? 

The Quiet Zone has the power to challenge people to reconsider their tech habits. The absence of cell service and the sparsity of public WiFi is enough to shock outsiders into questioning their reliance on their devices. One visitor to Green Bank told me that he felt convicted to stop sleeping with his iPhone. Others said they felt like they were going through tech withdrawal in Green Bank. The area is a reminder of the virtues of a simplified life. 

But I also found that the Quiet Zone is no utopia. While Green Bank initially sounded to me like a modern Walden that held lessons for the good life, I found that people there struggle with many of the same digital issues as the rest of us. They feel tethered to their smartphones, even if it’s just through WiFi. They still feel like they spend too much time in front of digital screens, even if the internet is incredibly slow. There’s no getting away from the tech revolution. 

Q. You haven’t had a cell phone for some time? We always have to email you to reach you about class planning for your courses at King’s. :) Tell us why and what experience you have had being so unconnected from the smartphone era?

When King’s College contacts me, I only get that message when I’m at my laptop. It means that work is essentially sequestered on my computer—employers can’t follow me on a smartphone that I could hypothetically check during a hike, a party, a movie. It helps me keep work separate from my personal life. I think it also helps keep me sane, because I get a break from the online world. 

From reading a lot of research into the negative effects of being constantly connected and tethered to social media, I’m pretty convinced that life is no worse without a smartphone and that it may well be better. Smartphones have been blamed for falling fertility rates, loss of sleep, lazy thinking, depression and suicide, not to mention a recent surge in traffic fatalities because of distracted driving. 

Stephen Kurczy

At the same time, to be honest, I’m personally online a lot even without a smartphone. Like so many people during the pandemic, I’ve been stuck inside, in front of a computer, rarely away from WiFi and my laptop, which has forced me to consider setting new boundaries with tech in my life. This could be as simple an act as closing my laptop at 6 p.m. for the rest of the evening. We all have to create quiet zones within our own lives. 

Gary Fong Discusses Impact of Photojournalism at Seventh Annual MPJI Lecture

This article was written by The Empire State Tribune staff writer Myrian Garcia and published on The Empire State Tribune website on April 6th, 2021. You can read more articles from The Empire State Tribune here.

Photojournalist Gary Fong, whose photographs have won him many awards such as San Francisco Bay Area Photographer of the Year and earned him the honor of having his work published in TIME Magazine, The New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, spoke at the Seventh Annual MPJI lecture on Wednesday, March 24.

Whether it is a shot capturing celebrity couples or biker gangs causing trouble, a photo entails a story that moves people, promotes change and advocates for action according to Fong.

“When we are out with cameras, we are a witness to history,” Fong said. “It is an awesome responsibility to watch history unfold.”  

During Fong’s career as a photojournalist in the ‘70s and ‘80s, photographers worked with the limitations of shooting film. 

“Be precise on what you shoot,” was the advice Fong gave to students aspiring to become photojournalists. 

With the development of digital cameras and editing software, it is much easier to create the perfect shot. However, new technology also makes it much easier to manipulate a photo from what it actually portrays. Fong warned the audience that precision and integrity will determine how a shot can move the hearts of viewers. 

Fong shared different pictures that depicted moments during wartime and damage caused by natural disasters. No matter how descriptive words in an article may be, a photograph of such devastation can allow the viewer to experience the event themselves. In history we’ve seen that a single photo can urge governments to fund programs and send help to those in need. According to Fong, the same photo that calls for government action can also unite the world. 

“Pictures have a tremendous amount of effect,” Fong said, “regardless of a person’s background.”

A message may get lost in translation, but photographs capture moments in a way that transcends language, nationality and culture.

Fong explained how he switched from a major in engineering to that of journalism per God's “calling.” After years of serving as a photojournalist, the stories he told and pictures he shared showed the audience that he fulfilled his calling by integrating his faith into his work. While Fong would have preferred to speak in person, he was still able to present his favorite captured moments on Zoom and tell stories that highlighted his career as a photojournalist.

The McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute and Acton Institute Host Skeptech

This article was written by The Empire State Tribune staff writer Esther Wickham and published on The Empire State Tribune website on March 3rd, 2021. You can read more articles from The Empire State Tribune here.

The McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute hosted SkepTech, a virtual webinar, last Thursday with bestselling author and political commentator David French.

The discussion centered around the discourse between the government, technology and free speech. Keynote speaker French, who currently serves as senior editor for The Dispatch and as a columnist for Time Magazine, opened the first half of the event with a lecture tackling free speech within technology and Big Tech companies.

“We’re weighting into a topic that has been more dominated by ignorance and outright dishonesty surrounding Section 230 and free-speech online,” French said.

Screenshot Courtesy of Esther Wickham

Discussing Section 230, French outlined why there is no trust between the government and individuals. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 states, “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” This act aims to provide immunity from legal responsibilities to Big Tech companies that decide to censor violent content on their social media platforms.

“Online speech was specifically created for moderation but is not being treated much like offline speech. The real object is not their bigness. It’s their ideology,” French said. “You begin to realize that your lines of communication to your public are in the hands of people who do not like your speech, and so you feel an enormous sense of vulnerability.”  

French concluded his lecture by restating the main reason why we are having these discussions. 

“We need to be careful not to let micro issues distract us from macro truth,” French said. 

In the second half of the event, French moderated a panel of guest speakers, including Dr. Mary Anne Franks, professor at the University of Miami School of Law, Al Sikes, current President of Hearst New Media, and Scott Lincicome, a senior fellow in economic studies at the Cato Institute. The panelists then discussed how Section 230 is giving more power to big companies. 

“With Section 230, these big dominating companies get this bubble wrap protection around them while private citizens don’t get special protection,” Franks said. 

The panelist concluded that these big companies could do more harm than good with this legal protection.

An Actor Discovered How Creatives Can Build A Personal Brand on TikTok

Brittin Ward works at The King’s College in NYC as Educational Ventures and Services Administrator. In that role, he helps organize several academic programs at King’s including the Summer Academy for high school students each July and the NYC Semester programs in Journalism and Theater for visiting college students from 41 partner schools.

We knew that Brittin is an aspiring actor, who stared in several theater productions at King’s and in New York City since he graduated from Kings in 2018. So we were excited to learn that Brittin has made the most of the Coronavirus pandemic by applying his theater skills and interests to a TikTok, where his videos have gained millions of views and hundreds of thousands of followers. Brittin maintains a humble and studious attitude about this social media virality. And he agreed to answer questions about what he’s learning on TikTok that other actors, creatives and journalists might appreciate.

Q - How did your life in theater change when Covid emerged last March, April and May?

A - Theater stopped--everything stopped. I love theater and acting and suddenly I was not able to participate in any of it for the foreseeable future. Other than a couple of Zoom improv classes I had no creative outlet. I was not in any shows at the time, but I was a member of a performing choir that stopped due to COVID. Like everyone else, I felt a bit lost. My dream has always been to have a career in theater, and though I've done a couple of professional shows, I still have not hit my stride with performing. I don't have an agent and am not equity, so like most other actors in the city I'd been in the trenches trying to get booked. I was already fighting discouragement with the rejections and failure of "making it" as an actor when COVID hit, so when it became clear that my dream was in limbo and it was uncertain when theaters would re-open, I realized I needed to shift my priorities.

Q - How did you decide to get involved with TikTok and why?

A - Prior to COVID, I had been growing increasingly interested in social media and the format of entertainment being delivered via the internet. The Actor's magazine "Backstage" and other actor publications have really been emphasizing the importance of having a presence on social media (here's a 2020 article from them on why every actor needs to be on social media). I made a TikTok account in December of 2019 because of the popularity the app was gaining and I posted a few videos to the app, but I was uncommitted prior to the pandemic. Once the theaters closed and I could not perform anything in person, I decided to spend all the found time I had in making videos for the internet and trying to build an audience. I decided to specifically start putting all my efforts into creating TikTok content because I knew that it was the fastest growing social platform in 2019-2020, it had the highest demographic of teen users at the time, and because I regretted missing the wave with Vine (a popular video app that died in 2016). I thought that if I could get good at keeping an audience engaged through short videos, it would help my storytelling skills and increase my understanding of what it takes to build an audience. Since I was trapped at home in quarantine anyway, I decided it would be a good way to have some sort of creative outlet while growing my understanding of how to keep people entertained.

Q - Tell us about how your audience grew there and what you learned from that audience?

A - It took a solid couple months of uploading consistently videos that barely broke 100 views before one took off and gained over a couple thousand views. From there it was probably another month and a half of posting before one of my videos broke the 100k views mark. As I continued to consistently post throughout the year, that window between the successful videos would grow shorter. Eventually, after about 6 months of posting with a few viral videos, I had gained a following of 40k. Up to this point, I had a general idea of the kind of audience I attracted (a younger demographic), so I started focusing my content more on what I thought they might find engaging. Taking the time to really work through that helped my growth and I was able to produce successful videos on a more consistent basis, ending the year with 590K followers. Consistency was the most important part of the growth. I posted videos daily for a few months, then pulled back to every other day once I started feeling burnt out.

I learned quite a lot from the audience, but I would say the two most important things would be: never-ending improvement, and consistency are key. There is always something I could improve in my videos whether it be lighting, sound, pacing, dialogue, etc. Also being consistent with the upload schedule and the kind of videos I posted were the most important factors of growth.

Q - Tell us about the process of figuring out what kinds of posts do well and play to your strengths? E.g. Do you do dances? Songs? Skateboard tricks? Monologues?

A - I quickly realized that I was (regrettably) not a part of the class of creators who could simply hit record, strike a couple poses, look attractive, and get millions of views. Nor was I a dancer. So, I took stock of what I was good at and how I might incorporate that into my videos. Being from a theater background, I was very familiar with conflict and motivation (i.e. what is the conflict of a story and what is motivating the characters to act), so I decided to try and incorporate that into my videos. I tried a basic skit where I played two characters fighting over something they both wanted (a yellow balloon), and I tried to keep the conflict at the center of the video. Conflict with high stakes engages an audience, and that was my first video to hit 1 million views. From there, I did a ton of research on how to make entertaining videos, what keeps people engaged, attended workshops, listened to podcasts--everything. I ruled out trying to do monologues or straight theater scenes as I saw other actors doing that on the app but found the videos to be pretty cringy. Not that my videos aren't cringy, but I had more fun going the direction I did.

Q - How might other young artists and actors think about personal branding and craft on platforms like TikTok, Snapchat and Instagram?

A - I am still trying to figure this out myself. I definitely think it's important to be on social media as an actor, since so much of the world relies on it. But I also see so many actors on social media only posting "actor" content, which I find really one-dimensional. As performers, our bodies are our instruments and our faces are our brand. As such, I think it's easy for us to be so self-focused that we get tripped up by what people actually enjoy or are entertained by. We post as a way to put ourselves out there, to show we're working on theater stuff, to say how happy and grateful we are to be involved in such-and-such production or Zoom play. But that does not attract an audience. That's "selfish content". The best thing you can do is offer value to people, whether that be information, entertainment or inspiration. Offering content that is valuable to people is what attracts them to follow you. I believe this is true across all social platforms.

Brittin Ward and his brother Titus

Q - What kind of discipline or time commitment have you developed and what might other people develop?

A - Each video I posted in the latter half of the year took around 3-4 hours to shoot, edit, and post, so it definitely required a good amount of discipline. That also does not include the time it would take to come up with a video idea and plan out the video. It sounds silly since it was only for TikTok, but I would literally storyboard my videos and break them down into increments of 5-10 seconds and plan what action I wanted to happen at which segment of the video. I basically spent all my time outside of my day job working on my videos.

Q - Why is it important for artists to build self-marketing skills?

A - Honestly, being cut off from theater was really great for me as it forced me to take stock of the direction my career was going and think creatively about how to entertain people. As an actor, I am my own business so it is solely up to me whether I succeed or fail. If I don't have the drive to keep picking myself back up after each failure and continuing to pursue my dream, it will not happen. Self-marketing is crucial for actors and entertainers, but I would emphasize the importance of not just self-promoting. No one likes that. But everyone appreciates a chuckle at a funny video, or feeling inspired to try something new because of a video they watched. I don't know who said this originally, but my dad always told me "people won't remember what you said or did, but they will remember how you made them feel.”

Q - When the pandemic is officially over (what a wonderful thought!) do you expect to remain as involved on TikTok? Or do you expect to channel your creative energies elsewhere?

A - I've really enjoyed building an audience on TikTok, and I will continue to post there, but I would also like to turn my attention to other platforms. With videos restricted to being 60 seconds long, I have a hard time creating content that connects with people on a deeper level. I don't think it's possible for a TikTok to have the same impact on a person as a great podcast or youtube video. You just can't go deep (whether it be comedy, inspiration, etc.) in 60 seconds. When the Pandemic lifts I will go back to auditioning and trying to book stage roles. However, I will continue to devote plenty of my time to making videos. I feel like I am only just now beginning to understand how all this social media stuff works, so I'd like to see what I can accomplish in another year.

- Edited by Paul Glader, executive director of MPJI.

MPJI is based at The King’s College in New York City. MPJI provides education, training and professional development projects for journalists at the high school, undergraduate and professional levels. It is named after the late John McCandlish Phillips, a legendary reporter at The New York Times.

Follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook @JMPjournalism and LinkedIn at McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute.

Jerry Mitchell: A Race Against Time

Jerry Mitchell’s memoir was published earlier this year by Simon and Schuster. In "Race Against Time", he recounts the investigation that reopened four notorious “cold cases” of the Civil Rights Movement. Mitchell’s work as an investigative reporter helped to send four Klansmen to prison decades after these crimes took place. His lecture at The King’s College coincides with the 150th anniversary of the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment, giving black men the right to vote.

Jerry Mitchell's memoir was published earlier this year by Simon and Schuster. In "Race Against Time", he recounts the investigation that reopened four notor...

Q & A with Alumna and New York Time's Fellow Reporter Sydney Franklin

By Paul Glader

Sydney Franklin is a reporter covering design, architecture and real estate in the fellowship program at The New York Times this year. Earlier in her career, she attended Milligan College in Tennessee, which is a partner school to the NYC Semester in Journalism (NYCJ) program. When she was an undergraduate at Milligan, she spent a semester at the Washington Journalism Center, which closed in 2015 to merge with NYCJ and reboot in NYC. Sydney is one of the more than 300 alumni of the two programs from 41 partner schools of NYCJ, a program that helps bring students from diverse backgrounds and geographies to learn and intern for a semester in the nation's largest and most important media market. We caught up with Sydney to hear more about her journey to The Times and into her niche covering design, architecture and real estate.

Tell us about your fellowship at the NYT and what beat you are covering

I'm a reporter on the Real Estate desk. The fellowship program aligns fellows with the desks most suited to their backgrounds. For me, real estate made the most sense after spending several years in design media covering architecture and cities. I consider the beat to be the missing link in my tool kit in terms of writing about the built environment, so I’m here trying to learn as much as I can about how selling and buying real estate affects the socioeconomic landscape of the city.

Photo submitted by Sydney Franklin

There are 35 of us total in the fellowship class and we all are having wildly different experiences at The Times (think photography fellows jetting off on Air Force One vs. me calling real estate CEOs from my kitchen). We'll be here for a year then the next class will take over. Unfortunately, until there is a vaccine, I won't have the pleasure of working at The New York Times in-person… inside one of the coolest buildings in the city and of course, one designed by Italian architect Renzo Piano...my dream!

Please explain your journey to Milligan College and Syracuse and into your coverage area now at the New York Times?

Photo taken by Lauren Turner

After taking an undergraduate course on the intersection of media, the arts and religion, I decided I wanted to become an arts journalist. I knew Syracuse's Newhouse School had the first program in the country dedicated to this specialty, so I made it my mission to get in. Once there, I narrowed down my focus even further to architecture and design reporting, studying mostly in the School of Architecture to begin my education in this very dense, complicated field. My program had previously graduated alumni doing big work in New York, some of them in communications at major architecture firms and others serving as editors at the top design magazines. I followed in their footsteps in some ways but broke out into mainstream news this past year with the fellowship at NYT. I've always wanted to find my way back to newspaper reporting so I could use my depth of knowledge on cities to help tell the kinds of stories that locals need to know about the place they live...and in a pandemic where interest rates on mortgages and apartment rents have dipped to record lows, there are so many important real estate stories to share out there.

How did your semester at WJC help you in your career journey? How important was it for you to study in a major city like DC or NYC?

My semester at WJC in Washington, D.C. was the foundation for everything I'm doing today. It sparked my love of major cities and my interest in politics at the local and national levels. I interned for Street Sense Media, which reports on homelessness in D.C. and empowers people experiencing it by allowing them to take part in the organization's business model. Folks who are homeless are as much part of a city's fabric and future as anybody else and I learned how to pay attention to their stories through my beat.

What advice do you have for NYCJ students from our 41 partner schools who are spending a semester in NYC in an internship and classes?

My advice is to learn how to take micro risks. You’ve already done something big by making the decision to move to New York for this program. From here, keep building on that by making small moves every day to reach your goals, whether you want to report a certain story, meet an influential editor, or secure another internship or job. Reaching those goals will require a series of somewhat calculated and bold risks. People want to help you in this industry, so don’t be afraid to ask for what you want.

We see a challenged media industry but also an innovative one. What hope do you think exists for young people in high school or college or are considering a career in the news media today and in the future?

One of the redeeming qualities of the news industry right now is that it’s made up of people from all backgrounds, veritable experts in their own unique life experiences. You don’t have to climb the traditional ladder of journalism to get to an editorship at a major paper. Yes, you need the reporting and editing experience, but you can pursue other passions in tandem with your writing goals. One of my fellowship colleagues has a Ph.D. in immunology and is our science reporter at The Times. Let that inspire you for the future. There are some really smart people out here making the industry more innovative simply by existing in the space. There’s space for you, too.

What do you do for fun in NYC?

In pre-pandemic times, one of my favorite things to do was go to concerts. Nowadays, I'm enjoying watching the seasons change by going on longer walks in my neighborhood or even hikes outside the city. I also coach youth lacrosse in my spare time, which is something I've continued to do this fall but socially-distanced.

As someone who writes about urbanism and architecture, what are three of your favorite locations or neighborhoods in NYC?

Photo submitted by Sydney Franklin

I love this question. One of my favorite vantage points in New York is the view of FiDi from the Staten Island Ferry. I also love driving on the West Side Highway where you get a quick glimpse of all sorts of big architecture all the way from the George Washington Bridge down to Tribeca. Cycling on the Greenway works, too! My favorite building is the Bank of America Tower by Bryant Park. One time, driving home from a hike, my friend pulled out a special app that allowed us to change the colors of the antenna from our car. It was like magic.

For others who enjoy reading and thinking about urbanism, what publications - magazines, websites and newspapers - do you like to read (besides the NYT)? What related authors and thinkers do you recommend on the topic?

I highly recommend following Curbed, which now operates under New York Magazine. Justin Davidson is one of the funniest and most accessible critics out there, as well as Alexandra Lange (find her books too). I am on the advisory board of an online publication that highlights the stories of women in architecture called Madame Architect. It's so inspiring.

Paul Glader is director of the McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute and co-director of the NYC Semester in Journalism (NYCJ). If you are a journalism professor or student interested in the program, email pglader@tkc.edu.

Fall ‘20 NYCJ Students Use Internships to Cover Elections and COVID-19

NYCJ Fall 2020 students Destinee Evans and Marlena Lang having a lunch meeting with Prof. Paul Glader and Prof. Clemente Lisi

Students who are part of the NYC Semester in Journalism (NYCJ) program have had plenty of success in their internships this Fall, covering the recent presidential election and the ongoing pandemic for a number of news organizations.   

This semester’s students followed in the footsteps of past NYCJ classes by participating in the unique semester-long, off-campus study program operated by the McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute at The King’s College in NYC.

“I am most proud of two articles that I wrote for my internship at Newsweek. The first was my very first article about mail-in ballot controversies around the nation,” said Marlena Lang, a Biola student who is part of the magazine’s newly-formed fact-checking team. “I was proud of this article because not only was it my first, but it is also the longest one I have completed after spending two days researching and writing it.

Lang said the other piece she is most proud was about the Pfizer vaccine “because I pitched them the idea and then completed the research and wrote the article.”

Destinee Evans and Marlena Lang in Battery Park

Destinee Evans, a student from Olivet Nazarene University, said her internship at the New York Daily News allowed her to cover COVID-19 and its impact on the Big Apple.

“During this internship, I have been able to interview families of people who may have just lost a loved one but getting to tell amazing stories about the people they love has been rewarding,” she added. “It can be a lot to take in sometimes but getting over the fear of talking to new people is something I will take with me throughout my career.”  

Students taking part in the eleventh NYCJ cohort that chose to come to New York in person this semester took advantage of TKC’s hybrid model, a mix of both online and in person classes as well as their internship. The students are enrolled in classes including Entrepreneurial Journalism with Prof. Paul Glader and a course called The City taught by Anne Hendershott. The City course – required of all NYCJ students – also serves as an elective for King’s students.

Under the guidance of Prof. Clemente Lisi, a former editor at the New York Post and New York Daily News, the students work 20 hours per week in a New York City newsroom, earning six academic credits and pursuing bylines.

Being able to live and work in New York City remains a huge appeal to students.

“Living in New York has been an amazing experience that I was worried would not happen,” Evans said. “Getting to go different places in the city with new friends has been fun. I know it’s not the same as semesters in the past but it is still something that I will cherish.”

The New York City Semester program partners with 40 universities and colleges across the nation and globe. Apply to become a partner school by contacting Paul Glader at pglader@tkc.edu. Apply to join us as a student for a future semester by clicking here.