Arthur F. Burns - icfj.org · “The Burns Fellowship mission has never been more vital.” T he Arthur F. Burns Fellowship pro-gram is an exchange of journalists between Germany

Arthur F. Burns Fellowship Program 2018 Annual Report 1

Arthur F. Burns

Fellowship Program

2018 Annual Report


Chairman’s Letter

Marcus W. BrauchliManaging Partner,North Base Media;

Former editor-in-chief of The Wall Street Journal and

The Washington Post

The Arthur F. Burns Fellowship celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2017. It also marked a tumultuous

year in transatlantic relations. The U.S.-German partnership has been one of the strongest and most stable in global affairs since World War II. It surprised even seasoned experts how quickly it deterio-rated over the past year—from questions about the U.S. commitment to NATO to talk of trade wars. The Trump administra-tion took more than a year to appoint an ambassador to Germany and Chancellor Merkel declared after the G7 meetings in May 2017, “The times in which we could completely depend on others are, to a certain extent, over. I’ve experienced that in the last few days. We Europeans truly have to take our fate into our own hands.”

The Burns Fellowship mission has nev-er been more vital. Each year the program works to increase public knowledge and understanding about the United States, Marcus Brauchli

Germany and Canada to counter-balance misinformation, and educates reporters to strengthen the media against distrust and attacks. While diplomatic relations are strained, Burns Fellows rise to the chal-lenge—producing hundreds of thought-ful, in-depth news pieces every year that inform citizens and elevate public dis-course on critical issues.

This valuable program enriches the journalists who participate, their readers and audience, and the broader transatlan-tic dialogue. It’s an outstanding program that makes an important contribution to-ward preserving the historic transatlantic bond. I’m proud to be associated with this program and look forward to many more years of its success.

Sincerely,

“The Burns Fellowship mission has never been more vital.”

The Arthur F. Burns Fellowship pro-gram is an exchange of journalists between Germany and the United

States/Canada, with the primary pur-pose of increasing public knowledge and understanding about the three countries, and the relations between them, through independent mass media. A parallel goal of the program is to develop reporters who are interested, skilled and informed about transatlantic relations. On its 25th anni-versary in 2013, the fellowship expanded to include Canada.

Each year, the program brings together 10 reporters from each side of the Atlan-tic and, following a week-long orientation program in Washington, places them in newsrooms of the other country to work for two months, producing articles and programs for home and foreign audiences.

Alumni of the Burns program consti-tute a strong and growing network of jour-nalists, many of whom move into positions of greater responsibility in the United States, Canada and Germany. The pro-gram is supported by a board comprised of leaders in journalism, business, diplomacy and government.

Mission

Cover Photos (clockwise from top): Oliver Bilger (Burns 2017) interviewing an actor who gives historic tours of Philadelphia; Mareike Aden (Burns 2016) reporting on a Trump protest in Miami; Steven Norton (Burns 2016) interviewing people at a TTIP demonstration in Berlin; Stefanie Dodt (Burns 2017) interviewing a Hurricane Harvey survivor whose home was destroyed; Max Muth (Burns 2017), at top left, facebooking live for The New Orleans Advocate on a rescue mission in Katy, Texas, after Hurricane Harvey (Photo credit: Travis Spradling/The Advocate).Writing and Editing: Maia Curtis; Design: Jill Gallagher

2017 Burns Fellows with Dr. Frank Freiling and Ambassador Peter Wittig at the GermanEmbassy reception in Washington, D.C.

years

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The Burns Impact

Left to right: Dana Heide (Burns 2016), reporting on Google; Yvonne Müther (Burns 2016) reporting on police education and the police academy in Dallas; Kajetan Dyrlich (Burns 2017) reporting in Houston.

Supporting journalists has a unique impact—a journalism fellowship not only benefits the participant,

but thousands of readers and viewers as well. By raising just one reporter’s quality of work, the effect is extensive—educating citizens and voters and informing high-level discussions between corporations, policymakers and diplomats. In addition, the Burns Fellowship’s influence extends to both sides of the Atlantic, as fellows produce stories for both their host and home news outlets.

Each year, 20-24 fellows are selected through a rigorous recruitment and ap-plication process. Fellows represent a wide range of media outlets, from smaller re-gional newspapers such as the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and the Heilbronner Stimme, to large national dailies like The Wall Street Journal and Süddeutsche Zeiting, and major broadcasters such as CNBC, CBC and Bayerischer Rundfunk. Fellows are placed at host news organizations for two months, where they produce stories for both their home and host media.

Each fellow makes an important con-tribution on both sides of the Atlantic to the quality of international news. The 2017 class started their fellowships as the German national election was heating up. U.S. and Canadian fellows were able to provide their home media with in-depth coverage that they could not have done from their desks back home or even on a short reporting trip.

“I found some interesting voices to highlight outside of my original plans,” said Colleen Hagerty of BBC North America. “These were the types of stories I never could have prepped for from the U.S., as it was only from meeting locals or seeing flyers around the city that I dis-covered them. I really enjoyed working on these stories in particular, as I felt like they were new and different voices for a North American audience to hear from about the

German election, and they each had inter-esting cultural parallels back to the U.S.”

“It was a great time to be in Germany,” wrote Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, an as-sistant editor at Foreign Policy magazine. “The federal elections were on September 24, right around the end of the fellowship, so editors back home were interested in all kinds of Germany stories. And I’m an in-ternational politics reporter so it was like being in a candy shop. I got to write tons of election-related pieces and in the days right around the election, I got more TV and radio requests than I knew what to do with.”

On the other side of the ocean, Ger-man fellows were able to help their host media cover the German elections, bring-ing their unique perspective to stories and editorial advice on coverage. For example, Kajetan Dyrlich, a reporter with MDR, was hosted by CBC News in Toronto and was able to pitch in on their German elec-tion stories.

“I found him [Dyrlich] extremely help-ful in helping guide us (me) through the German election story and the refugee stories,” wrote Raj Ahluwalia, currently a senior producer at CBC News Investiga-

‘Emissaries of a Transatlantic Perspective’

tive Unit and formerly the senior producer for The National. “Just as importantly, he was willing to share his thoughts and expe-riences, especially with our relatively inex-perienced associate producers at the time.”

The 2016 class performed similar roles in the lead up to the U.S. election. Claire Williams, a business reporter for the Ar-kansas Democrat-Gazette at the time of her 2016 fellowship, was hosted by Süddeutsche Zeitung in Munich.

“I discovered that my colleagues at SZ and Germans in general were interested in talking about the election, and even more interested when they found out that I’m living and working in Arkansas,” she wrote. “It turned out my niche at SZ was being the expert in non-coastal elite America.”

While Claire helped her host make sense of the U.S. election campaign, that was only one of many issues she and the other fellows covered in their productive time abroad. “Throughout the course of my fellowship, I spoke with German farmers and policy experts about agriculture and politics in Germany, but I ended the fel-lowship with stories from across all differ-ent industries and policy areas,” she wrote.

Fellows’ output is diverse and extensive.

Dana Heide (Burns 2016), a correspond-ent for Handelsblatt, chose to work at The Wall Street Journal in San Francisco to fo-cus her reporting on the tech industry.

“My goal was to learn about the Silicon Valley culture. And I did. I took my time to really get to know it, allowed myself to meet more people than was probably nec-essary for my stories in the end, and trav-elled to the Valley frequently. I ended up writing two bigger reports for Handelsb-latt around that topic and a few other sto-ries, one for example about the method of using data to predict crime. I also wrote a weekly column for Handelsblatt Online—a good way to make use of all the informa-tion that would not make it into a bigger article but was also very interesting.”

Oluwakemi Aladesuyi (Burns 2016), currently a producer for Gimlet Media and previously at NPR, wrote a lengthy article for The Atlantic about East Ger-man pickles, EU trade certifications, and the complex path of negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Part-nership (TTIP).

Burns Fellows’ contribution to interna-tional news is deep, broad and substantial. In just two months, each class produces

“The best work I did happened whenever I em-braced my role as an American abroad in Ger-many, rather than trying to shake it. A piece I wrote about the violence in Charlottesville from my vantage in Berlin garnered hun-dreds of thousands of page-views on NPR.org, and was one of the most popular articles that month. So my next bit of advice to new fellows: lean in to the perspective that you bring as an outsider. You might see things in a new way.”—Maggie Penman (Burns 2017), Contrib-uting Reporter, National Public Radio, Wash-ington, DC; Hosted by: DPA International Desk, Berlin

“Thanks to the Burns Fellowship, I not only learned what it means to work as a correspond-ent and prove myself to my newsroom, but un-expectedly I got to know a very cool city and a progressive country. Toronto is fabulous—a kind of relaxed New York, with fantastic res-taurants, hip bars, and a beach right in the city. But what impressed me deeply, especially in light of the move to the right and the growing hostility toward foreigners in Germany, is how this country deals with its immigrants, how naturally the social life of multiple nationali-ties functions. Toronto is one of the most mul-ticultural cities in the world, more than half of the population was not born in Canada, more than 230 different nationalities live there—and at the same time, it is one of the safest cities in the world. I am very grateful that I had this experience—in retrospect I am glad that I did not land in New York and instead got to know a completely new city.”—Judith Liere (Burns 2017), Reporter, Stern, Hamburg; Hosted by: VICE Canada, Toronto, ON


approximately 250 stories. And their sto-ries cover a vast range of topics, includ-ing comparing the bikeability of Denver to Munich, Daimler’s investment in its Tuscaloosa plant to expand production of electric cars, Cuban life in Miami, how Germany is handling its refugee influx, Prime Minister Trudeau’s use of social media, and a comparison of Germany’s historic memorials versus those in the United States after the neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville.

Fellows appreciate the valuable boost the program provides their career. As they learn and grow, many get promoted or re-ceive coveted correspondent positions af-ter their fellowships. But their readers and audience are the true beneficiaries of the program—gaining deep insights into the many issues, both big and small, that affect the transatlantic community. The world gets smaller every day, and Burns Fellows are there to explain it.

Barbara Junge, a 1998 alumna and now a host to new fellows as deputy editor-in-chief of Die Tageszeitung, summed it up when she wrote, “Arthur F. Burns Fellows are true emissaries of a transatlantic per-spective.”

Maggie Penman (Burns 2017) interviews FDP politician Sebastian Kluckert in Berlin


0 participants1-4 participants5-10 participants11-20 participants20+ participants

Florida3

Louisiana1

Mississippi Georgia8

Alabama1

South Carolina

1

Arkansas

Texas5

North Carolina6Tennessee

1

New Mexico

Oklahoma

Arizona1

Kentucky

Virginia:8

Maryland: 10Delaware

Kansas Missouri1

West Virginia

Colorado5

Indiana1

Ohio4Nevada

Utah

California42

Rhode IslandConnecticut: 1

Pennsylvania3

Illinois3

Massachusetts: 6

Nebraska

Iowa1

Wyoming

New York51

Vermont1

New Hampshire: 2

Michigan1

South Dakota

Oregon2 Wisconsin

3

Maine

North Dakota

Idaho

Montana1

Washington7

Minnesota5

District of Columbia: 37New Jersey: 5

Quebec1

British Columbia

1

Ontario8

Alberta

Saskatchewan

Manitoba

“My Burns experience informs my work as a startup reporter every single day. Spend-ing time in Berlin gave me a new perspec-tive on Silicon Valley, and I continue to stay in touch with some of the companies I connected with during my travels.” —Cat Zakrzewski (Burns 2017), Venture Capital Reporter, The Wall Street Journal, San Francisco, CA

“Experiencing the energy and confi-dence in the newsroom of The Wash-ington Post strengthened my belief in the future of journalism again. They had already lost big parts of their newspaper and now it is thriv-ing again. What especially impressed me was the determination of report-ers regarding neutrality and objectiv-ity—especially during the polarized campaign of 2016. This experience made me look at German newsrooms in a more critical manner. We tend to give our opinions too much room. I had a great time in Washington. I was just sent on a one-month-long reporting trip to the U.S. Without the experience that I gained through the Burns Fellowship, this might not have been possible.”—Philipp Alvares de Souza Soares (Burns 2016), Tech Re-porter, Manager Magazin, Berlin

Baden-Württemberg14

Rheinland-Pfalz

5

Hessen23

Nordrhein-Westfalen25

Bayern37

Thüringen2

Sachsen7

Sachsen-Anhalt

Niedersachsen3

HansestadtBremen:

1

Berlin119

Mecklenburg-Vorpommern1

HansestadtHamburg

51

Saarland1

Schleswig-Holstein:

1

Brandenburg4

Burns alumni are also living and working in these countries:Austria: 3Belgium: 3Cabo Verde: 1China: 1

Egypt: 2France: 3Israel: 1Italy: 2

Japan: 1Mexico: 1The Netherlands: 1Russia: 6

Singapore: 4Sweden: 1Switzerland: 2

Thailand: 1Turkey: 2United Kingdom: 8

United States &Canada

Germany

Where Burns Alumni Are Now The program’s 575 alumni span across their countries and the world

0 participants1-4 participants5-10 participants11-20 participants20+ participants

“My Burns Fellowship didn’t just cover my living expenses during my time in Berlin. Fellow Burnsies also helped me find a translator and fixer, facilitated a meeting with a member of the German parliament, and introduced me to the editor at Foreign Policy who would end up publishing the feature article that resulted from my work during the fellowship. (And, as it happens, that editor is also a Burns Fellow.) The fellowship was invaluable, in more ways than I can count.” —Vauhini Vara (Burns 2017), Contributing Writer, NewYorker.com, Fort Collins, CO

“The Burns Fellowship has broadened my horizons. It allowed me to gain experience in a new and international professional setting, making me able to compare and improve my way of doing journalism. I am sure it will be a strong argument to convince my newspaper to send me to report from abroad in the future.” —Philippe Teisceira-Lessard (Burns 2017), Reporter, La Presse, Montréal, Canada

“If you want to understand how German companies operate in deep Trump country, you have to go there. You have to talk with ordinary citizens. Trump has heavily criticized the German economy for its export surplus in recent months. And hardly a state exports as much as Baden-Württemberg, where my home paper is located… Such conversations can only be conducted in person—they have changed the way I think and write about this country.”—Anne Guhlich (Burns 2017), Senior Economics Editor, StuttgarterZeitung/Nachrichten, Stuttgart

“In the summer of 2016 in Florida, which later voted for Donald Trump, I spoke to many unlikely Trump voters and thus got a glimpse of his election victory later that year. I also took part in one of the few press conferences with then-candidate Trump and a couple of his rallies. These invaluable insights helped me understand the phenomena of his presidency early on.”—Mareike Aden (Burns 2016), Freelance Journalist, NDR/ARD TV, Hamburg

“For me, NPR was one of the most intense, fascinating and educational times of my career. How do I sell a story? How can radio stations effectively promote their work on the web and through social media? These questions provided me with good food for thought.”—Yvonne Müther (Burns 2016), Editor, WDR, Köln


A Portrait of Two Fellows

When asked recently why she applied to the Burns Fellow-ship in 1998, Barbara Junge

responded, “Why would one not apply for Burns? I was and still am—though the political circumstances are difficult these days—in love with that country. Not to mention that U.S. journalists for a long time have been the heroes of journalism. I was covering security issues at the time and wanted to compare certain features. So I had an idea what I wanted to cover and the fellowship made it possible.”

At the time, Barbara was a local re-porter for die taz and still quite new to journalism. She was intellectually curious, eager to explore and test out being a for-eign correspondent. Like many fellows, she discovered the fellowship experience to be a real gift for a young reporter—a chance to get off the treadmill of beat re-porting and delve deeply into chosen top-ics, a chance to explore a wide range of interests in a vast country.

“The fellowship gave me the opportu-nity, time, helpful American colleagues—everything I needed to concentrate on thorough reporting over a longer period of time. It was kind of a time between times. I could write for the U.S. paper, I could do stuff for my home paper. But mainly I was free to set my own agenda.”

She was sent to The San Diego Union-Tribune and threw herself into learning

everything she could about the newspaper and the region.

“At my U.S. host, I made friends with a bunch of people and they took me every-where. Whatever they were reporting on from politics, to music, to sports, to social issues. I am thankful to them still today.”

She worked heavily on a story about community policing that she planned be-fore leaving Germany. But she discovered new and surprising sources while report-ing in the U.S., and later won the Burns Award for her article, which appeared in Deutsches Allgemeines Sonntagsblatt.

When asked about a particular high-light from her fellowship, she is hard-pressed to pick just one. The whole expe-rience was enlightening and positive, and she went home determined to return one day as a U.S. correspondent.

“I went home with experience, new friends and befriended colleagues, with a lot of insight and an expanded profession-al network. My bond to the U.S. became closer with the fellowship.”

In the following years, Barbara took advantage of several IJP alumni tours—to Israel, Turkey and Syria—to continue learning and building her resume. She eventually became the Berlin bureau chief of die taz, and then switched to Der Ta-gesspiegel to become a U.S. correspondent out of their Washington bureau. After al-most four years in DC, she returned to die

taz as their deputy editor-in-chief.Although it’s been 20 years since

her fellowship, she still keeps in regular touch with many “dear friends” from San Diego and still feels a strong bond to the program. She recently ran into a fellow Burns alumnus in a Berlin restaurant. At the time of their fellowship, they worked at the same paper, but their careers have since taken them in different directions. They are now both back in Berlin and Barbara writes, “every time we run into one another, we both seem to enjoy the moment and feel close. I can say Burns definitely forms a bond.”

The Burns Fellowship, along with sub-sequent alumni trips, were formative ex-periences for Barbara. As she describes it, they “set the tone” for her professional development—and what turned into a highly successful journalism career.

Barbara JungeDeputy Editor-in-ChiefDie Tageszeitung (die taz)

Anton Troianovski started as an intern at The Wall Street Journal less than two weeks after gradu-

ating from college. Three years later, after covering commercial real estate, he was interested in going overseas and ready to explore new opportunities when he learned about the Burns Fellowship. The program seemed like a good fit and he ap-plied in 2011.

“I wanted to experience new profes-sional challenges, write new kinds of sto-ries, refresh my German, learn about Ger-man journalism, and see if indeed being a foreign correspondent was something that I wanted to do,” Anton wrote. “I got all of those things out of the fellowship.”

Anton was hosted by Der Tagesspiegel in Berlin, but as they were most interested in stories about the United States from him, he started splitting his time with the

Journal’s Berlin bureau to cover German stories as well. For Der Tagesspiegel, he wrote about topics such as the U.S. debate over the debt ceiling and the Internet’s impact on American politics. Most of the Journal’s Berlin reporters were focused on the euro crisis, which left the field wide open for Anton.

“I could write about pretty much what-ever I wanted but had to work hard to find something of interest to the editors back in New York that wasn’t euro-related. I sought to write ‘a-heds,’ the quirky stories that run on the bottom of Page One every day.”

His second a-hed, about controversy in the world of German facial-hair competi-tions, turned out to be a highlight of his fellowship and one of his most memorable early journalism experiences.

“My reporting trip by plane, car and train across southern Germany to report the facial-hair a-hed gave me an unfor-gettable taste of the feelings of discovery, independence, and adventure that remain my favorite things about being a foreign correspondent.”

His experience on the fellowship not only cemented his interest in working as a foreign correspondent, it also gave him the tools and connections to make the first step.

“Writing for the Journal during the fel-lowship turned out to be a seminal experi-

ence in my professional life,” Anton wrote recently. “I learned to think more creatively and to shape story narratives more careful-ly. I learned that it can sometimes be good to operate at a slower, more thoughtful pace than the hectic newsroom environment of-ten allows.” In addition, the contacts he made while working at the Journal’s Berlin bureau helped secure him a job there when one opened up a couple of years later. And once he started as a correspondent in Ber-lin, his Burns experience and connections helped him hit the ground running.

“Once I arrived in 2013, I benefited from my friendships with fellow Burns alumni and events such as the Burns annual din-ner, giving me a wonderful network from the start.”

After four years in Berlin covering Ger-man politics and society, as well as varied topics such as the Ukraine crisis and the Sochi Olympics, Anton took a new job as the Moscow bureau chief for The Washing-ton Post.

Still early in his career, Anton has already held two prized correspondent positions—engaging and enlightening his readers on some of the most important international stories of the day. And the Burns Fellow-ship helped him take his first step.

“Burns played a really big role in setting me on a path to be a foreign correspond-ent.”

Anton TroianovskiMoscow Bureau ChiefThe Washington Post

How the fellowship changes lives

“I went home with experience, new friends and befriended colleagues, with a lot of insight and an expanded professional network. My bond to the U.S. became closer with the fellowship.”

“I wanted to experience new professional challenges, write new kinds of stories, refresh my German, learn about German journalism, and see if indeed being a foreign correspondent was something that I wanted to do. I got all of those things out of the fellowship.”

Junge with the Hillary Clinton campaign in Manhattanon election night 2016.

Troianovski reporting from the Russia-Norway border in the Arctic in January 2018 (Photo credit: Ksenia Ivanova).

(photo credit: Bertrand Benoit)


Burns Alumni Resources

After 30 years of Burns Fellows, alumni have spread throughout the industry and risen through

the ranks of their newsrooms—as editors, correspondents, and often managers of their media outlet’s foreign coverage. The Burns Fellowship works hard to keep these journal-ists informed and productively engaged on transatlantic issues. The fellowship is com-mitted to providing long-term support to its alumni, which it accomplishes through a number of resources.

Alumni study tours are a key tool for educating journalists on a particular topic of importance to the partner countries or related to the transatlantic relationship. In December 2016, 13 Burns alumni traveled to Germany for a four-day study and report-ing tour centered around Germany’s energy transition, the Energiewende. The group met with officials from private energy companies and government leaders on climate and

energy policy to learn more about Ger-many’s ambitious goals and progress toward renewable energy production. The program included a dinner with both German and American Burns alumni living in Berlin to share information about the upcoming German elections.

“As a political reporter, the Energiewende was an entirely new topic for me: my past experience with covering energy and climate issues has been confined to how the topic is used in campaign and political rhetoric here in the U.S.,” participant Emily Schultheis (Burns 2013) wrote. “But with a packed study tour full of industry and political ex-perts, I came away with a new understand-ing of the issue and its importance. Overall, the tour was a useful and interesting deep dive into an issue about which I previously knew very little—and a wonderful chance to bond with fellow Burns alumni from all corners of the journalism world.”

The Holbrooke Grants are another valuable resource for alumni working on ambitious journalism projects. These grants, which honor the international service of Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, are awarded to alumni to support a large report-ing project about the partner country or a transatlantic issue. They provide the time and funding for journalists to delve deeply into a topic of interest—a rare opportunity for daily reporters and a gift for their audience.

Recent Holbrooke awardee Ilya Mar-ritz (Burns 2003), a reporter for WNYC in New York, researched German media and their reporting on crime and migra-tion. His stories were broadcast on “On the Media” and explored how German media are grappling with publishing information on ethnic or national identity when report-ing on crime. A recent survey showed that German readers overestimated migrants’ roles in crimes and questioned whether their

newspaper was reporting on it openly and accurately. Marritz discovered many paral-lels to populist movements in the United States and the struggle to reclaim credibility among news outlets.

Another recent Holbrooke grant win-ner is Anna Sauerbrey (Burns 2013), who produced a major multi-media report for her paper Der Tagesspiegel on racial justice and the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States. Sauerbrey crisscrossed the country exploring the issues of police and state violence, mass incarceration, and black empowerment. She covered the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s annual conference, as well as interviewing one of the founders of Black Lives Matter, comedian W. Kamau Bell, and residents from Baltimore’s east side, among many others. Her report detailed the progress made on racial justice, but also the many issues that remain from the early civil rights movement.

Neither of these alumni could have produced such thought-provoking and extensive reports without the support of the Holbrooke Grants.

Annual dinners offer alumni a chance to network and hear from eminent speakers

on transatlantic affairs. Recent keynote speakers have included Harjit Singh Sajjan, Canada’s Minister of National Defence; Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, former Ger-man Defense Minister and current chair-man of Spitzberg Partners; Max Hollein, Director of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; and Christoph Heusgen, Ger-man Ambassador to the United Nations. To encourage high quality reporting, awards are presented at these dinners to alumni who have produced outstanding work on a transatlantic topic.

Finally, in honor of its 30th anniversary, the Burns Fellowship hosted a panel discus-sion in May 2017 to commemorate another historic milestone—the 30th anniversary of President Ronald Reagan’s famous speech at the Brandenburg Gate. The panel in-cluded Burns trustee Richard Burt, the U.S. ambassador to Germany at the time, and Peter Robinson, the speechwriter who wrote what is now considered Reagan’s best speech. Moderating the panel was Romesh Ratnesar, journalist and author of Tear Down this Wall: A City, a President, and the Speech that Ended the Cold War.

While so much in global politics and media has changed in the intervening years,

the Burns Fellowship mission remains as vital now as it did in the months follow-ing Reagan’s demand that the Berlin Wall be torn down. And now, with 30 years of alumni continuing this important work to further understanding between the United States, Germany and Canada, the program’s impact is broader than ever.

Photos below, left to right: (1) 2016 Alumni Study Tour on Germany’s energy transition; (2) Christoph Heusgen, German Ambassador to the United Nations, at 2018 New York Dinner; (3) Kennan Award winner Nicolas Richter and Burns Award winner Marie-Astrid Langer (Burns 2015) with then-U.S. Ambassador and Burns Patron John B. Emerson at 2016 Berlin Dinner; (4) Damaso Reyes (Burns 2007) at New York Dinner; (5) 2017 Burns Award winner Nora Gantenbrink (Burns 2015); (6) Kennan Award winner Ansgar Graw and Burns Award winner Kerstin Kohlenberg (Burns 2002) at 2017 Berlin Dinner; (7) Frank-Dieter Freiling with Max Hollein, director of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, and German Consul General Hans-Ulrich Südbeck at 2017 San Francisco Dinner; (8) Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg at 2017 New York Dinner; (9) Brandenburg Gate panelists and Burns board members in front of a piece of the Berlin Wall in DC - from left: Peter Robinson, speechwriter to President Reagan; former U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Burt; German Ambassador to the U.S. Peter Wittig; Burns chairman Marcus Brauchli; and Burns board member Frank Loy; (10) Panelists at Brandenburg Gate event: Robinson, Burt, and Romesh Ratnesar, author, Tear Down This Wall: A City, A President, and the Speech That Ended the Cold War; (11) New York Dinner; (12) Emily Schultheis (Burns 2013) at New York Dinner.

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Host News Organizations

UNITED STATES & CANADA

The Austin American Statesman—Austin, TXCBC—Toronto, ONThe Denver Post—Denver, CODiscourse Media—Vancouver, BCThe Globe and Mail—Toronto, ONThe Miami Herald—Miami, FLMic—New York City, New YorkNBC/MSNBC—New York City, New YorkThe New Orleans Advocate—New Orleans, LANPR—Washington, D.C.The Oregonian—Portland, ORThe Philadelphia Inquirer—Philadelphia, PA ProPublica—New York, NYThe Seattle Times—Seattle, WAVulture.com—New York, NYThe Wall Street Journal—San Francisco and

Washington, D.C., bureausThe Washington Post—Washington, D.C.WLRN-Miami Herald News—Miami, FL

GERMANY

Agence France Press—BerlinBILD—Berlin Correctiv—BerlinDeutsche Presse-Agentur—BerlinDeutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa), English/

International Service—BerlinDeutsche Welle TV—BerlinDow Jones—Frankfurt/MainHandelsblatt—BerlinKölner Stadtanzeiger—KölnMitteldeutscher Rundfunk - MDR Radio—Halle,

Leipzig and DresdenSpiegel Online—BerlinSüddeutsche Zeitung—MünchenDer Tagesspiegel—BerlinDie Tageszeitung (taz)—BerlinDie Welt—Berlin

The following media organizations hosted Burns Fellows from the 2016 and 2017 classes

German Hosts“Having fellow journalists from abroad in our editorial offices is always an enrichment for us. This has once again been demonstrated by Lisa Hagen who worked at the Handelsblatt Berlin office during the 2017 federal election campaign. The vivid exchange about differences and similarities in terms of working methods, as well as transatlantic topics and challenges, proved to be a great benefit for everyone in our editorial office. Lisa Hagen wrote a regular column for the Handelsblatt digital channels about the American perspective on the federal election campaign and the time after, which was well received by our readers. We are already looking forward to the next Burns fellow!”—Thomas Sigmund, Berlin Bureau Chief and Head of Politics,Handelsblatt

“Sara [Germano] was at BILD during the height of the German federal election campaign, which was great for her as well as for us. Sara could really help us to avoid some of the mistakes the U.S. me-dia made during the presidential election campaign, like for exam-ple not looking sufficiently into certain voting blocks which feel ne-glected by their government. It was wonderful to have her with us.”—Nikolaus Blome (Burns 1993), Deputy Editor-in-Chief, BILD

“Shara Tibken was a real enrichment for our editorial office. Due to her great knowledge of Silicon Valley, her placement proved to be a benefit on both sides: We were able to learn more about the compa-nies and way of thinking in this exciting region. Shara, on the other hand, has not only learned about the work inside a German daily newspaper, but also gained knowledge during her research and trav-els on what an important role innovation and digitalization plays in German companies.”—Ulrich Schäfer, Head of Economics, Süddeutsche Zeitung


U.S. and Canadian Hosts“We enjoyed hosting Martin Schlak in the business section at The Seattle Times. Among other things, his expertise and interest in bio-technology proved fortuitous. He wrote an excellent, in-depth piece on one of our large biotech companies, interviewing a patient in its clinical trial and explaining how the company plans to move forward after some major setbacks.”—Rami Grunbaum, Business Editor, The Seattle Times

“Alexandra [Eul] was a welcome addition to the Globe’s newsroom, where she spent time on the Arts, Opinion and National desks. She quickly proved herself capable of adding to our audience experience, penning columns about life in Canada from her unique perspective as a foreign journalist. In addition to making a real contribution to the Globe in her second language, Alexandra also immersed herself in the culture of the newsroom and was an equally avid student of Canada during her time at the Globe, using her free time to travel widely and immerse herself in a broad range of places and experiences. This will-ingness to engage helped inform the pieces she wrote for the Globe and also the perspective she has since applied to her work at Emma.”—Gabe Gonda, Managing Director, Corporate Development, The Globe and Mail

“Our Burns Fellow [Kajetan Dyrlich] fit in from the day he arrived. He was very curious about Canadian political life and social issues. He quickly zeroed in on specific stories he wanted to cover and need-ed very little assistance or support to bring them to life. He had a nice, relaxed presence on camera and provided CBC News with a number of interesting value-added reports including analysis of the German election campaign.”—Greg Reaume, Managing Editor, CBC Daily News and Bureaus

“The Discourse benefitted from hosting Daniel Stahl in 2016 as part of the Arthur F. Burns Fellowship. He quickly adapted to our collab-orative culture and was able to contribute to both investigations and our overall thinking on digital engagement. We really valued learning from Daniel and having him as part of our team.”—Lindsay Sample, Managing Editor, Discourse Media

Above: Sara Germano (Burns 2017), hosted by BILD in Berlin, interviewing a voter in Bonnahead of the German election. Right: Colleen Hagerty (Burns 2017) before filming a stand-up for BBC North America about forming political parties in Germany, with the Reichstag in the background.

Left to right: Dylan Robertson (Burns 2016), hosted by Kölner Stadtanzeiger, interviewing locals in front of Cologne’s central station; Simon Schütz (Burns 2017), hosted by NPR; Daniel Stahl (Burns 2016), hosted by Discourse Media in Vancouver, interviewing Canadian Minister of National Defence Harjit Sajjan; Alexandra Eul (Burns 2017), hosted by The Globe and Mail, Toronto; Kajetan Dyrlich (Burns 2017), hosted by CBC in Toronto, on the set of The National.


Program DonorsThe following individuals, corporations, organizations and foundations have generously donated to the 2016-2018 Arthur F. Burns Fellowship programs Sponsors in the United StatesAB InBevAmerican Friends of BuceriusBASFBismarck Capital LLCBMW of North America, LLCBrauchli-Farley FundBurson-MarstellerComcast NBCUniversalEdelmanEII Capital Management, Inc. Ford FoundationGoldman, Sachs & Co.GWFF USA, Inc.Kaye Family FoundationThe Ladenburg FoundationMasterCardPew Charitable TrustsThe Wall Street Journal

Individual ContributionsThomas BanseJoyce BarnathanJames D. BindenagelRichard BurtNikhil DeogunDavid DetjenJacob HeilbrunnFrank E. LoyRichard G. LugarRick PereraDavid H. PetraeusSusanna RayDamaso ReyesKaren SamelsonStanford S. Warshawsky

Sponsors in GermanyAllianz SEAuswärtiges AmtBMW AGBundesministerium für Familie, Senioren, Frauen und Jugend

Deutsche Bank AGSiemens AG

In-Kind Contributions Deutsche Bank AGGoldman, Sachs & Co.Lufthansa German AirlinesPhillip C. Zane

North America

Germany

Arthur F. Burns Trustees

Patrons/Schirmherren: The Honorable Peter Wittig, German Ambassador to the United States of America (until June 2018); The Honorable Emily Haber, German Ambassador to the United States of America (from July 2018); The Honorable Sabine Sparwasser, German Ambassador to Canada

Donald Baer, Worldwide Chair & CEO, Burson-MarstellerJoyce Barnathan, President, International Center for Journalists (ICFJ) Ambassador (ret.) J.D. Bindenagel, Henry Kissinger Professor of Governance and International Security, University of Bonn, Germany

Rebecca Blumenstein, Deputy Managing Editor, The New York TimesMarcus W. Brauchli, Co-founder and Managing Partner, North Base Media; Consultant, Graham Holdings Company (Chairman)

Elisabeth Bumiller, Washington Bureau Chief, The New York TimesAmbassador (ret.) Richard Burt, Senior Advisor, McLarty Associates

(Honorary Chairman)Dr. Martin Bussmann, Managing Director, Mannheim Holdings LLCNikhil Deogun, Senior Vice President, Business News, CNBCDaniel Eilemberg, President and Chief Content Officer, FusionDr. Frank-Dieter Freiling, Director, Internationale Journalisten Programme (IJP), e.V. (Burns President)

Prof. Dr. Ronald Frohne, President and CEO, GWFF USA, Inc.Ambassador (ret.) Marie Gervais-Vidricaire, Former Canadian Ambassador to Germany

Jacob Heilbrunn, Editor, The National InterestJames F. Hoge, Jr., Senior Advisor, Teneo Intelligence (Honorary Chairman)Martina Hund-Mejean, Chief Financial Officer, MasterCard, Inc.Mitra Kalita, Vice President of Digital Programming, CNNDavid Kamenetzky, Chief Strategy & External Affairs Officer, AB InBevAmbassador (ret.) Robert M. Kimmitt, Senior International Counsel, WilmerHale; Former Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Treasury

The Honorable Dr. Henry A. Kissinger, Chairman, Kissinger Associates; Former U.S. Secretary of State

Bernhard Kuhnt, President and CEO, BMW of North America, LLCChristian Lange, President and CEO, EII Capital Management Inc. The Honorable Frank E. Loy, Former Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs (Honorary Chairman)

Senator Richard G. Lugar, President, The Lugar Center; Former United States Senator

Davan Maharaj, Former Editor-in-Chief and Publisher, Los Angeles TimesKati Marton, Journalist and AuthorJennifer McGuire, General Manager and Editor-in-Chief, CBC News and Centres

Matt Murray, Executive Editor, The Wall Street JournalGen. David H. Petraeus, Member, KKR & Chairman, KKR Global InstituteJohn F. W. Rogers, Executive Vice President, Goldman, Sachs & Co.The Honorable Hugh D. Segal, Master, Massey College; Former Canadian Senator

Calvin Sims, President and CEO, The International HouseDr. Nina Smidt, President, American Friends of BuceriusWayne T. Smith, Chairman of the Board and CEO, BASF CorporationRobert Steiner, Professor of Global Practice, Director, Fellowships in Global Journalism, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto

Kara Swisher, Co-CEO, Revere Digital; Co-Executive Editor, Re/code; and Co-Executive Producer, The Code Conference

David Walmsley, Editor-in-Chief, The Globe and MailStanford S. Warshawsky, Chairman, Bismarck Capital, LLC (Vice Chairman)Legal Advisor: Phillip C. Zane, Adjunct Professor, Dept. of Health Administration and Policy, George Mason University

Patrons/Schirmherren: The Honorable Stéphane Dion, Canadian Ambassador to Germany; The Honorable Richard Grenell, U.S. Ambassador to Germany

Sven Afhüppe, Editor-in-Chief, HandelsblattDr. Thomas Bellut, Director-General, ZDFProf. Dr. Reinhard Bettzuege, Former German AmbassadorNikolaus Blome, Deputy Editor-in-Chief, BildKlaus Brinkbäumer, Editor-in-Chief, Der SpiegelMichael Bröcker, Editor-in-Chief, Rheinische Post

Tom Buhrow, Director-General, WDRStephan-Andreas Casdorff, Editor-in-Chief, Der TagesspiegelDr. Mathias Döpfner, CEO, Axel Springer SEThomas Ellerbeck, Director, TUI AGDr. Wolfgang Fink, Co-CEO, Goldman Sachs SELeonhard F. Fischer, Partner, RHJI Swiss ManagementDr. Rüdiger Frohn, Former State Secretary; Advisory Board, Mercator GmbH Foundation

Emilio Galli-Zugaro, Chairman, Methodos S.p.A.Prof. Monika Grütters, State Minister for Culture and MediaDr. Tessen von Heydebreck, Former Member of the Board, Deutsche Bank (Honorary Chairman)

Peter Limbourg, Director-General, Deutsche WelleGesine Lötzsch, Member of Parliament, Die LinkeGeorg Löwisch, Editor-in-Chief, Die TageszeitungRob Meines, Meines & Partner, Den HaagMathias Müller von Blumencron, Former Editor-in-Chief of Digital Media, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

Claudia Roth, Vice President of the Bundestag, Member of Parliament, Die Gruenen

Helmut Schäfer, Former State Minister, Foreign Office (Honorary Chairman)Sabia Schwarzer, Head Group Communications, Allianz SESteffen Seibert, Parliamentary State Secretary, Government SpokespersonChristian Sewing, CEO, Deutsche Bank (Chairman)Dr. Dominik Wichmann, Co-Founder and CEO, Looping Group

16 Arthur F. Burns Fellowship Program 2018 Annual Report

Arthur F. Burns Fellowship Program

IJP

International Center for JournalistsEmily Schult, Deputy Vice President, Programs

2000 M Street, N.W., Suite 250Washington, D.C. 20036 USA

tel: 202.737.3700 • fax: 202.737.0530email: [email protected]/burns

Internationale Journalisten-ProgrammeFrank-Dieter Freiling, Director

Postfach 156561455 Königstein/Ts. GERMANY

tel: +49(0)6174 7707 • fax: +49(0)6174 4123email: [email protected]/afburns

2016 Burns Fellows with Ambassador Peter Wittig at the German Embassy in Washington, D.C.

Documents

Arthur F. Burns - icfj.org · “The Burns Fellowship mission has never been more vital.” T he Arthur F. Burns Fellowship pro-gram is an exchange of journalists between Germany