A Letter to CCJ Members From the New Executive Director

To: The Members of the Committee of Concerned Journalists

From: Executive Director, CCJ

My name is Jeffrey Dvorkin and beginning in July, I will be the new executive director of the Committee of Concerned Journalists.

Let me say at the outset how thrilled I am to be joining you. CCJ has a powerful reputation as a leader in setting high journalistic standards and in working closely with news organizations to continue to raise those standards.

CCJ has been ably guided by Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel. They remain on the board of CCJ and I look forward to working with them both. CCJ has also been strengthened by its connection to the University of Missouri School of Journalism. This is a wonderful relationship that has been and will continue to be of enormous benefit to CCJ through the School’s deep commitment to research and training. I can’t think of a better partner in this collective effort to make our journalism work better for the benefit of an open democracy.

A few words about where I come from: My career has been for the most part in public radio in the United States and in Canada. For the past six years, I’ve been the Ombudsman at NPR. Before that, I ran NPR’s news department as Vice President for News from 1997-2000. I came to NPR from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in Toronto where I was the Managing Editor and Chief Journalist at CBC Radio from 1991-1997.

Before that, I worked my way through the various thickets of freelancing journalism, television and radio news, first as a city hall reporter in Montreal in local tv news, then as a news producer for CBC TV in their Parliamentary bureau in Ottawa. I came to CBC TV’s national news in Toronto and worked as a producer and an editor before going over to CBC Radio in 1985. As well, I’ve been a journalistic trainer in Slovenia, Poland, Hungary, Turkey, Portugal and Chile.

My deepest commitment is to make journalism transparent and accountable to the people we serve on radio, television and online. I am always open to good ideas and I read and answer all emails. I hope you will take advantage of this and let me know your thoughts on CCJ and the state of journalism overall.