2019 Ochberg Fellowship

November 19, 2018

The Ochberg Fellowship, now in its 20th year, is the Dart Center's flagship program for senior and mid-career journalists who wish to deepen their knowledge of emotional trauma and psychological injury, and improve reporting on violence, conflict and tragedy. The next fellowship will take place July 22-27, 2019. The application deadline has passed.

2017 Ochberg Fellow Narendra Shrestha

Hindu devotees offer ritual prayer at the Hanumante River during the Madhav Narayan Festival in Bhaktapur, Nepal, on January 2, 2018. The Madhav Narayan festival is a full month devoted to religious fasting, holy bathing and study of the Swasthani book.

Reporting responsibly and credibly on violence or traumatic events — on street crime and family violence, natural disasters and accidents, humanitarian crises, war and genocide — is a major challenge. The Ochberg Fellowship enables 12-14 outstanding journalists from around the globe to explore these critical issues during a week of seminars held at Columbia University in New York City. Program includes briefings by prominent interdisciplinary experts in the trauma and mental health fields; conversations with journalist colleagues on journalism ethics, craft, and practice; and various other opportunities for intellectual engagement and peer learning.

The Fellowship is led by a core faculty of journalists and mental health professionals from the Dart Center, along with a visiting faculty. Past fellowship faculty have included:

The 2018 Dart Center Ochberg Fellows pose for a group photo in front of Columbia Journalism School.

  • Jelani Cobb, Professor of Journalism, Columbia Journalism School, and Staff Writer, The New Yorker
  • Judith Lewis Herman, M.D., Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School and author of Trauma and Recovery
  • Alex Kotlowitz, author of There Are No Children Here and The Other Side of the River
  • Karestan Koenen, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatric Epidemiology, Harvard T.H.Chan School of Public Health
  • Jessica Stern, author of Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill and Denial: A Memoir of Terror.
  • Jonathan Shay, M.D. Ph.D., Clinical Psychiatrist, MacArthur Fellow and author of Achilles in Vietnam and Odysseus in America
  • Steven Southwick, M.D., Glenn H. Greenberg Professor of Psychiatry, Yale School of Medicine and co-author, Resilience: The Science of Mastering Life's Greatest Challenges.

The fellowship is named in honor of Frank Ochberg, M.D., a pioneer in the study of trauma.

The program will be held July 22-27, 2019 at Columbia University in New York City.

The deadline to apply -- February 13, 2019 at 5:00 pm EST -- has passed. Click here for application guidelines.

Click here for testimonials from recent fellows.

And click here to learn about last year's fellows, and here to see all past fellows.