NEFAI 2022

About the New England
First Amendment Institute

Journalists from a variety of media and all six New England states will gather at Northeastern University in Boston from Oct. 23 to Oct. 25 to learn the latest investigative and database reporting techniques and public records access skills. The fellows chosen for this 12th annual New England First Amendment Institute reflect today’s diverse news media and come from daily and weekly newspapers, television and radio stations and online publications. Learn more about previous institutes here.

Supporters

This year’s institute is made possible by the generosity of Northeastern University, the Academy of New England Journalists, the Rhode Island Foundation and Boston University.

Many thanks to those who provided in-kind support, including the Nackey S. Loeb School of Communication, WBUR-Boston, Preti Flaherty LLP, Oliverio & Marcaccio LLP and Seven Days.

In addition to those named above, we would like to thank the following Leadership Circle donors and Major Supporters for their contributions: Hearst Connecticut Media Group, The Boston Globe, Paul and Ann Sagan, The Robertson Foundation, WBUR-Boston, Society of Professional Journalists Foundation, Genie Gannett for the First Amendment Museum, Linda Pizzuti Henry, Connecticut Public and GBH-Boston.

Locations

In addition to local freedom of information law workshops, the Institute will be at the following locations in Boston from Oct. 23 to Oct. 25:

Northeastern University

The Institute will be held at Northeastern University, 360 Huntington Avenue in Boston. For more than 40 years, the university’s School of Journalism has combined academic excellence with practical experience, preparing students to be analytical thinkers and successful communicators. Here’s more information on Northeastern University. A campus map can be found here.

Tuscan Kitchen

Dinner on Oct. 23 will be provided at the Tuscan Kitchen, 64 Seaport Boulevard in Boston.

The Westin Copley Place

The Institute hotel and the location of our Oct. 24 keynote presentation and dinner is The Westin Copley Place, 10 Huntington Avenue in Boston. The hotel is a short walk from the Northeastern University campus. Those needing a hotel room must email justin@nefac.org by Oct. 1.

NEFAI 2022 News

• NPR’s Sacha Pfeiffer Joins New England First Amendment Institute as Keynote Speaker
• Meet NEFAC’s 2022 New England First Amendment Institute Journalism Fellows
• IRE President Mark Walker, Reporter at New York Times, to Deliver Closing Address at NEFAI 2022
• Sewell Chan, Editor in Chief of The Texas Tribune, to Open NEFAI 2022
• Applications for New England First Amendment Institute Now Available; Deadline August 12

Application Materials — Closed

• Application and Recommendation Form

Institute Links and Materials

• Curriculum (Schedule, Documents and Presentations)
• NEFAI 2022 Program (Includes Bios and Contact Info)
• Evaluations
• Future Fellow Nominations

Keynote Speakers

Day One | Sewell Chan, The Texas Tribune
Chan joined The Texas Tribune as editor in chief in October 2021. Previously he was a deputy managing editor and then the editorial page editor at the Los Angeles Times, where he oversaw coverage that was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing in 2021. Chan worked at the New York Times from 2004 to 2018, as a metro reporter, Washington correspondent, deputy Op-Ed editor and international news editor. He began his career as a local reporter at the Washington Post in 2000. A child of immigrants, Chan was the first in his family to graduate from college. He has a degree in social studies from Harvard and a master’s in political science from Oxford, where he studied on a British Marshall scholarship. He serves on the boards of Columbia Journalism Review, Freedom House, Harvard Magazine and News Leaders Association. He is a member of PEN America, the Council on Foreign Relations and numerous journalism organizations.

Day Two | Sacha Pfeiffer, NPR
Sacha Pfeiffer is a correspondent for NPR’s Investigations team and an occasional guest host for some of NPR’s national shows. Pfeiffer came to NPR from The Boston Globe’s investigative Spotlight team, whose stories on the Catholic Church’s cover-up of clergy sex abuse won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, among other honors. That reporting is the subject of the movie Spotlight, which won the 2016 Oscar for Best Picture. Pfeiffer was also a senior reporter and host of All Things Considered and Radio Boston at WBUR in Boston, where she won a national 2012 Edward R. Murrow Award for broadcast reporting. While at WBUR, she was also a guest host for NPR’s nationally syndicated On Point and Here & Now.

Day Three | Mark Walker, The New York Times and IRE
Mark Walker is an investigative reporter in the Washington bureau of The New York Times and president of Investigative Reporters and Editors. He was part of The Times team that won a Pulitzer Prize for its coverage of Covid-19 in 2020. Walker joined The Times in 2019 as the Freedom of Information Act coordinator for the Washington bureau. Before joining The Times, Walker was an investigative reporter at The Argus Leader in South Dakota and a former training director for IRE.

Faculty and Presenters

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NEFAI 2022 Fellows

All fellows pictured left to right by state.

#NEFAI2022 Twitter

Photos