Shorenstein Center names spring fellows, visiting faculty

The Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, located at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, recently announced its spring fellows.

“With the presidential campaign already in overdrive, it is especially appropriate that this spring the Shorenstein Center will be extra heavy in political expertise and campaign savvy,” said Alex Jones, director of the center.

The Shorenstein Fellows will work on research projects while at the center. The 2007 spring fellows are as follows:

Linda Douglass, former chief Capitol Hill correspondent at ABC News, will be the first Kalb Fellow at the Shorenstein Center. She will examine network and cable news coverage of the immigration debate.

Ellen Goodman, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist, will be a Goldsmith Fellow at the Shorenstein Center. Her research will address the question of a new gender gap in the news media and the Internet.

Mark Halperin, political director of ABC News and founder and editor of “The Note,” ABCNews.com, will be a joint visiting fellow with the Institute of Politics and Shorenstein Center.

Michael Maier, founder and CEO of the German company Blogform Publishing, will be the Shorenstein Center’s Sagan Fellow. His research will examine the changes in the media industry and in politics owing to blogs, user-generated content, social media, and Internet newspapers.

Elizabeth Stein is a doctoral student in political science at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her research will examine political activists’ use of the media to gauge government tolerance and assess the risk of participation in anti-regime activities and authoritarian rule.

In addition, Mark McKinnon, chief media adviser to President George W. Bush during the 2000 and 2004 election campaigns, will be an adjunct lecturer in public policy. McKinnon will teach “Modern Political Communications: From the White House to the Blogosphere.”

The Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy is a Harvard research center dedicated to exploring the intersection of press, politics, and public policy in theory and practice. The center strives to bridge the gap between journalists and scholars and, increasingly, between them and the public.