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The Poynter Institute is a school and resource for journalism, located in St. Petersburg, Florida. It was founded in May 1975 by Nelson Poynter, chairman of the St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly bearing the name Modern Media Institute. In 1984 it changed to The Poynter Institute for Media Studies.

In 1976 the Poynter Institute counts no more than 4 employees and 267 students. In 2002 the respective numbers are 59 employees and more than 1,200 students.

One of Poynter's most popular endeavors is Jim Romenesko's blog covering journalism and the media, hosted on Poynter's Web site. The blog, which gets high traffic from industry professionals, was included News.com's Blog 100 for Media blogs.[1]

The Poynter Summer Fellowship is a six-week summer program at Poynter that teaches young journalists the skills they need to become a better writer, designer, or photojournalist.

Poynter's program has been an important stepping stone for journalists including them Ceci Connolly, a national reporter for The Washington Post; Steve Dorsey, AME Presentation at the Detroit Free Press; and Jason DeParle, the award-winning reporter for The New York Times who is currently on tour promoting "American Dream," his book about poverty in America. Other alumni are working at The New Republic, The Keene (N.H.) Sentinel, The Des Moines Register, South Florida Sun-Sentinel, The Washington Post, St. Petersburg Times, The Miami Herald, Orange County (Calif.) Register, MSNBC.com, The New York Times, and The Boston Globe, to name a few.

The participants in the program spend six weeks covering a community beat in St. Petersburg, a city of 250,000, and small cities on Florida's Gulf Coast.

Students collaborate through written and visual storytelling. They meet weekly deadlines and have their work published in the program's online publication. The students work on a team including writers, photojournalists, and graphic designers.

They learn on the beat and in the classroom. The faculty teach and demonstrate reporting methods, ethical decision-making, computer-assisted investigation, Web production, photojournalism, a variety of writing techniques, and the creative skills necessary to produce innovative and solid design.

Some of the previous years' guest faculty included such award-winning journalists as Anne Hull of The Washington Post; Tom French from the St. Petersburg Times; David Leeson, 2004 Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist for The Dallas Morning News; Andrew Skwish, an illustrator whose work has appeared in various publications; J. Kyle Keener, Detroit Free Press chief photographer; Dr. Mario Garcia, president and CEO of Garcia Media; David Yarnold, former editor and senior vice president of the San Jose Mercury News; and Archie Tse, graphic projects director for The New York Times.

• Poynter.org official site

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