Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma

New Orleans Needs Santa, Now!

By John Pope

In the first scene of John Patrick Shanley's remarkable play "Doubt," a priest delivering a sermon has this to say about the aftermath of a traumatic event: "Imagine the isolation."

Letter From New Orleans: Facing Two Storms

By John Pope

A reporter from The Times-Picayune in New Orleans reflects on the arrival of Hurricane Gustav almost exactly three years after the descent of the catastrophic Hurricane Katrina.

Getting it Right

Reporting on Youth Violence

Even as crime hits record lows in New York, among teenagers around the nation, gun homicides, gang violence and police shootings of young people are on the rise. Yet while shootings in suburban schools, churches and malls generate media controversy, epidemic levels of teen homicide in cities like Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and New Orleans attract scant attention.

Reporting on Youth Violence

Low crime rates mask an epidemic of violence among urban youth, but how can journalists get this story right? A panel discussion convened by the Dart Center and Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

"An Entire City, Gone"

Covering the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina

By Elizabeth Aguilera and Chris Walker

Denver Post reporter Elizabeth Aguilera and Post photojournalist Craig Walker are in Metairie, a suburb of New Orleans. Elizabeth talked to fellow Post reporter Amy Herdy and provided this first-person report, sent Thursday, Sept. 8.

"Words Fail..."

Covering the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina

By Penny Cockerell

I arrived on Monday afternoon and spent about a week covering the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in the outlying areas of New Orleans.