JLI Educator Fellowship
Put Effective Communicators to practice in your classroom
Learn how to prepare your students for communicating in an increasingly complex world. The JLI Educator Fellowship trains and supports middle and high school teachers to lead the Effective Communicators project in their classrooms. This fellowship is open to teachers in every state in the US! No journalism experience is required.
About Effective Communicators
The Effective Communicators project supports the teaching of 21st century skills with an engaging student-centered approach. The 45-day standards-aligned, project-based curriculum can be taught within an English Language Arts course or as an elective in 6th–12th grades. All lessons and resources are available through an intuitive online platform. Students who participate emerge as effective communicators by researching, interviewing, writing, and publishing stories about self-selected community issues.
Students will learn
Teachers will receive
30 Lessons Designed for ELA Classrooms
The standards-aligned ELA unit includes detailed lesson plans, slides, worksheets, videos, podcasts, writing exemplars, assessments.
10 Hours of Professional Development
Self-paced online training helps teachers with no journalism background gain confidence as they unpack instructional materials and build their understanding
Opportunities for Networked Peer Learning
A discussion board connects teachers, including JLI mentors, to a community of peers who are also leading the project.
Explore the learning platform
The online platform offers a simple, organized way to preview, use, download, copy or print the Effective Communicators resources from any device.
About the fellowship
The JLI Educator Fellowship will support a limited number of middle and high school teachers in its 2024-2025 cohort. Admitted teachers receive a $500 stipend for completing training and implementing the project. Teachers can apply a portion of their stipend towards earning one graduate credit (20 professional development units) through the University of Oregon.
The process
The rolling application period is currently open. Once accepted, fellows will follow this process:
Explore these sample materials
FAQ
Here are answers to the most frequently asked questions about the fellowship.
You need never have taught journalism to teach JLI’s Effective Communicators project, which is informed by journalistic principles and practices—but is not a “journalism” course. In fact, this program is geared specifically for middle and high school English language arts teachers with no prior journalism experience. Our self-paced online professional development modules provide foundational understanding and allow you to unpack the project materials at your own pace. Lesson plans are designed so that a substitute teacher can easily facilitate them. Language Arts teachers will recognize most of the skills and instructional practices in these lessons, which cover 94% of the ELA College and Career Readiness Anchor Standards.
Partially. The curriculum is a complete set of supplemental materials, including detailed daily lesson plans and supporting materials such as slides, printable sheets, podcasts, and videos. It is designed to replace one quarter or trimester of your informative reading and writing instruction. It is modifiable so you can adapt it to your students and school calendar.
No. The Effective Communicators course is a perfect complement to your school’s journalism or yearbook program. It can act as a feeder course to prepare students for those classes. Additionally, it supports English teachers in meeting informative reading and writing standards, and cultivates curious, analytical and media-literate readers and writers.
We’re looking for enthusiastic educators who are eager to improve engagement and deeper learning among their students through JLI’s project-based approach. All 2024-2025 fellowship applicants must be full-time middle or high school teachers anywhere in the United States.
JLI’s work is informed by the pedagogical practices of our cofounder, acclaimed educator Esther Wojcicki at Palo Alto High School. University of Oregon professor Ed Madison and Wojcicki collaborated to develop the curriculum’s core principles. Twenty-year veteran language arts teacher Melissa Wantz developed the approach into a cohesive student project especially for teachers with no journalism experience. More information about JLI’s history and program development is available here. Since 2015, JLI has positively affected the lives of nearly 6,000 students in more than 50 middle and high schools in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Arizona and California.
JLI is an independent Oregon-based 501c3 nonprofit organization that works in partnership with the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication (SOJC) and College of Education (COE). Ed Madison is an SOJC associate professor and has affiliated status with the COE. He also serves as JLI’s executive director.
The Effective Communicators Course honors student cultures, backgrounds and communities while connecting academic learning to their lives, passions and struggles outside of school. Two key components of the project are student-centered practices and meaningful connection between school and the local community. Student-centered practices include participatory decision making, such as the freedom to choose topics of concern that are culturally and socially relevant to them; and working in teams to select meaningful texts, research, write, give and get feedback, publish, and reflect together. Students invite community members into the classroom to share knowledge and stories, deepening the connection between school and the outside world. Teachers shift roles as needed, acting as instructors, guides, mediators, consultants and advocates for their students.
Please contact Susan Szafranski at susan@journalisticlearning.org with questions.
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