Exciting news!
The Mail & Guardian seeks a young person to take up a one-year Fellowship opportunity provided through the Eugene Saldanha Memorial Fund, now supported by the Summit Educational Trust. The Eugene Saldanha Fellow will focus on the climate crisis.
Based at the M&G newsroom in Johannesburg, this role will prioritise reporting on communities that are not in the media spotlight. The climate crisis is a complex story but at its core is a tale of social injustice and power. Across our print and digital platforms, the M&G seeks to hold power to account and investigate the status quo. Our starting position is that the world, and this country in particular, in their current form perpetuate abuses of power that manifest themselves in environment problems ranging from mines polluting rivers to power plants releasing the carbon that drives global heating.
Your job will be to investigate why this continues and talk to affected communities.
The M&G has reported on environment and climate throughout our history, back to our founding by staff in 1985. Working here will mean that you will compete with other reporters to lead the news agenda each day on our digital platforms and each week in the newspaper. While this is an entry-level position, ours is a newsroom where we share ideas and work together to craft stories that set the national agenda. A good idea, well executed, will get as much attention as any other story by any other reporter.
While you will get constant help in growing into the climate beat, we expect someone who has strong ideas and is willing to go out and make them happen. Those stories will then be told across print, with an expectation that you also drive conversation on social media (particularly twitter) and are open to the idea of working on other media, such as podcasts.
You will report to the news editor. The monthly cost-to-company is R10 000.
What do we need you to have:
- A working knowledge of climate change and understanding of why media are increasingly calling it the climate crisis.
- Proven written ability, with a sample of your writing.
- Have a degree. It doesn’t have to be in journalism.
- Demonstrate a commitment to social justice.
- Be prepared to work in challenging urban and rural environments, as well as everything in-between.
- Be able to communicate in at least two official languages.
- Have a valid driver’s license.
- A working knowledge of WordPress is a benefit.
Please email Sipho Kings ([email protected]) a brief (350 word max) motivation and an idea of what you would report if you were the M&G‘s climate fellow. Attach two samples of your writing as well as two references. Put Eugene Saldanha in the subject line.