Eric Freedman

Eric Freedman is Professor of Journalism and former Associate Dean of International Studies and Programs. During his 20-year newspaper career, he covered public affairs, environmental issues and legal affairs for newspapers in New York and Michigan, winning a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of a legislative corruption scandal. He teaches environmental journalism and serves as Director of the Knight Center for Environmental Journalism. He also teaches public affairs reporting, international journalism, feature writing and media law and serves as Director of the school’s Capital News Service, a professional-level internship program in which students cover state government for more than 25 newspapers and online news outlets across Michigan. Freedman earned his bachelor’s degree in government from Cornell University, his law degree from New York University and his master’s degree in resource development from MSU. Internationally, he has taught journalism as a Fulbright scholar in Lithuania and Uzbekistan, led workshops and seminars for professional journalists in Central Asia, and lectured to students in Singapore, Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Japan and Kyrgyzstan.
He served for three years as an International Scholar in the Open Society Foundation’s Academic Fellowship Program, where he worked with faculty members in the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication at American University of Central Asia in Kyrgyzstan.
As a professional journalist and freelancer, Freedman has written for newspapers and magazines on such environmental issues as habitat protection, parks and public lands, toxic substances, extinction, ecotourism and government regulation. At MSU, he directed the Australia Media, Environment, Culture and Tourism study abroad program, the Reporting in the British Isles study abroad program, and a freshman seminar abroad on environment and media in Scotland.
His research interests include press systems and journalism practices in the former Soviet Union: international journalists’ professional standards and education; public affairs reporting; news coverage of human and political rights; and U.S. political history. Among his books are Environmental Crises in Central Asia: from Steppes to Seas, from Deserts to Glaciers; Presidents & Black America: A Documentary History; After the Czars & Commissars: Journalism in Authoritarian Post-Soviet Central Asia; and African Americans in Congress: A Documentary History.
He began his career as an aide to U.S. Rep. Charles Rangel of New York before becoming a reporter for the Knickerbocker News in Albany, N.Y., and then The Detroit News Lansing bureau. After teaching as an adjunct at the School of Journalism, he joined the faculty full-time in 1996. He continues to write for a variety of publications on environment, public affairs, legal issues and other topics.
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Gathering and Developing the News (Coursera)

Journalists develop information through interviews and sources. The most successful journalists quickly master these important skill sets. The production of journalism relies on several elements: newsgathering, interviewing sources, researching and trying to find as much information as possible. The course will also teach you how to where to find [...]

What is news? (Coursera)

This course will guide you through the basic elements of professional journalism and the news values and ethics of covering real-world issues and events. The overview and examples of the types of news coverage helps introduce the different types of journalism, such as social media, multimedia, print, visual and [...]

Journalism, the future, and you! (Coursera)

You will learn about the career paths that are available in journalism, and what opportunities the skill sets of a journalist can offer in other fields. You will explore areas such as being an international correspondent, self-publishing in journalism, as well as how to freelance in the field. You [...]

Effectively delivering the news to your audience (Coursera)

Being a successful journalist is more than hunting down information. How journalists process the information, then put it together, are key steps for news reports. You will learn the process, planning, requirements of how journalists develop their news reports. There are many ways to report news reports, and you [...]