Oxford Climate Journalism Network
Every story is a climate story. Our network supports reporters and editors who want to make the climate crisis a central element of their journalism.
The Oxford Climate Journalism Network (OCJN) works with a global community of reporters and editors across platforms and beats to improve the quality, understanding and impact of climate coverage around the world. The OCJN is a programme at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford.
The mission of the OCJN is to help journalists, editors, and media executives across the world develop their coverage of climate change. Our programme also supports newsroom leaders in identifying and addressing the range of operational, cultural and ethical issues that encompass climate stories and can help expand the coverage of this issue.
It is open not only to science, environmental or climate journalists but equally to journalists of any other vertical who are interested in adding the climate dimension to the topics they currently cover, as well as editors and news media executives. Our working assumption is that climate change is not only a topic but rather a systemic issue that affects all verticals of a typical news organisation, including its culture, lifestyle, health, technology, architecture, food, sports or travel journalism.
Our work is structured around four pillars:
- Our flagship online course: crafted for practising journalists and editors and lasting six months, the course provides members with support in identifying relevant sources, sessions with world-leading experts, and connects them with colleagues at other news organisations.
- Annual leadership programmes for senior editors and newsroom managers from around the world selected for breadth, diversity, impact and commitment to implementing change in newsrooms.
- Journalist Fellowships for mid-career journalists to join us in Oxford to work on projects related to different aspects of how news media approach climate change.
- Original academic research to track how people access climate change news in a range of countries, how and whether they share it, what they think of it, and how much trust they have in it.
If you want a bespoke course for your news organisation on how to develop your coverage of the climate crisis, please send an email to reuters.institute@politics.ox.ac.uk and we'll get back to you to discuss fees, details and possible dates.
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The Oxford Climate Journalism Network was co-founded in 2021 by the then Reuters Institute’s Deputy Director Meera Selva and Visiting Fellow and Advisory Board Member Wolfgang Blau. The European Climate Foundation provided generous funding for the first year of activities. The OCJN was awarded a grant from the Laudes Foundation to continue operations until the end of 2023.
The network has been led since October 2022 by the current Director of Journalist Programmes Mitali Mukherjee.