Global Business Journalism Program
at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China
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Covering the world: Journalism projects by GBJ students
Whether completing professional-quality journalism projects for class or writing for internships and free-lance assignments, GBJ students gain practical experience while earning their master's degrees. Here are some samples of their work.
Created by Global Business Journalism students in 2017, the nu-women.com website tells the stories of young women entrepreneurs in China. Some of the businesswomen are Chinese, some are foreign. They all explain one of the most rapidly growing sectors of the Chinese economy: women who launch their own businesses.
Nu-women.com is regularly updated by Global Business Journalism reporters. Content is created and edited by GBJ students. The site is supervised by Professors Rick Dunham and Min Hang. Its original managing editors were Alexis See Tho, a 2018 graduate from Malaysia, and Sarah Talaat, a 2018 graduate from the United States. Nu-women.com is sponsored by Kering.
Multimedia journalism by Betsy Joles (entered GBJ in 2018)
Photography
Betsy has had her work published across the world, including this photo in The Washington Post on October 30, 2019. It accompanied an article about the Chinese city where most of America's Halloween decorations are made.
Betsy Joles shot the feature photo for a story by The Washington Post's Anna Fifield. >>> Read the story.
Breaking news
As Hong Kong's violent protests spread to college campuses, Betsy was there, taking us inside the upheaval at one HK university. It was published by CNN on November 18, 2019.
Betsy Joles took us inside a campus in turmoil for CNN
>>> See the multimedia story.
Words and images
Betsy Joles co-wrote and took photographs for an article on the struggles faced by domestic workers in Hong Kong amid the ongoing protests. It was published by Al Jazeera on October 21, 2019.
>>> Read the story.
Sijia Li, intern at Agence France-Presse in Beijing (entered GBJ in 2018)
Sijia Li collected some impressive bylines during her 2019 internship in the Beijing bureau of Agence France-Presse. Here are some samples:
Virtual boyfriends
Beijing (AFP) - Chinese teen Robin spends hours online chatting to her man, who always has a sympathetic ear for her problems -- as long as she's willing to pay him.
The 19-year-old pre-medical student has spent more than 1,000 yuan ($150) speaking to "virtual boyfriends".
These aren't seedy sex-chat lines but men who charge for friendly and flirty online communication, from wake-up calls to lengthy text exchanges and video conversations.
"If someone is willing to keep me company and chat, I'm pretty willing to spend money," said Robin, who didn't want to give her real name.
Climate change
Beijing (AFP) - Nations rich and poor must invest now to protect against the effects of climate change or pay an even heavier price later, a global commission warned Tuesday.
Spending $1.8 trillion across five key areas over the next decade would not only help buffer the worst impacts of global warming but could generate more than $7 trillion in net benefits, the report from the Global Commission on Adaptation argued.
"We are the last generation that can change the course of climate change, and we are the first generation that then has to live with the consequences," former UN chief Ban Ki-moon, who chairs the commission, said at the report's launch in Beijing.
Nico Gous, covering events on the Tsinghua campus (entered GBJ in 2019)
By NICO GOUS
When you are a journalist at a wire service, you are always on deadline.
“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone to a news conference and the local reporter says, ‘Ah, busy day for me. I’ve got two stories to do.’ OK, dude. At the AP [Associated Press], in one day, you could do 50 [to] 75 stories … You’ll do so many stories, when you go home, you won’t remember [them],” veteran US journalist Patrick Casey told journalism students at Tsinghua University’s School of Journalism and Communication on Oct. 29.
“You’re always on deadline. Always. As soon as you get a story, start working on it. If I give you a story and I see you get up, go get some coffee, maybe get on WeChat, aargh, don’t. Don’t do that.”
As a reporter for the largest U.S. wire service, Casey covered the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, in which Timothy McVeigh killed 168 people by exploding a truck bomb in front of the federal courthouse. While a young reporter in Arkansas, he covered the rise to power of future president Bill Clinton. He has lived in Beijing for the past 11 years, where he now works as a business news editor at CGTN.
How do you cover big or traumatic stories? Take a deep breath, don’t think about what you’re seeing, do you work, and don’t cry, Casey said.
“You cannot help but be affected. You can’t. But later, not then,” he advised the students.
Naanga Enkhtur, covering poverty in China and Mongolia (GBJ graduate, 2019)
A young man in old, graying clothes sits, surrounded by the bustle of Beijing’s central business district, with its towering skyscrapers and opulent hotel lobbies. As formally dressed business people rush by, he sits quietly on a staircase, practices Chinese characters. They pay no attention to him or his dirty bare feet, the calloused soles of which mark him as homeless.
He doesn’t seek attention — no begging cup before him — instead, he collects recyclable plastic bottles to make ends meet. He lives on less than $2 per day. A canvas bag full of
empty plastic bottles and winter clothes sits behind him; his worldly possessions and income can be carried over his shoulder.His life on the street begins before sunrise, in order to transcribe Buddhist sutras for the whole day. It is apparent he is unschooled when you see his handwriting.
As the sun sets and busy white-collar workers are replaced by revelers on a night out, he goes to sleep in a small garden in front of a luxurious hotel. Whether in the heat of summer or the cold of winter, he has done the same things over and over again, for the last four years —
ever since he discovered Buddhism.
His name is Fang Shixiong, and his early life in Jilin province was tough. At the age of 5 he was left to fend for himself when his parents passed away. Now 23, he has been homeless for 18 years. A loyal theist, he is one of 30 million people still living under the poverty line. He nervously muttered as he told me his story, often repeating the phrase: “What is happening here?”
Multimedia Reporting course, final group project:
By Wenyu Fang, Graham Dickie, Yuqi Ning and Sasha Urman (December 2017)
Informational graphics
