so you want to be a science writer

So You Want to Be A Science Writer…

NASW Mentorship ProgramBoston, February 15, 2013

Ivan Oransky, MDExecutive Editor, Reuters HealthCo-Founder, Retraction Watch

Treasurer, Association of Health Care JournalistsActing Director, SHERP, New York University

Twitter: @ivanoransky

How I Got Started

My First Mistakes

My Path• Summer internship at local Gannett daily• Med school (working at JAMA, writing op-eds)• Psychiatry internship (writing regular columns for

American Medical News, the Forward)• Freelancing ~ 1 year• First full-time journalism job: Editor-in-Chief of

Praxis Post• Followed by The Scientist, Scientific American,

Reuters Health

• 95 weekly science sections in newspapers in 1989

Columbia Journalism Review: http://www.cjr.org/currents/hard_numbers_jf2013.php

Who are Today’s Media, Really?

• 34 in 2005

• 34 in 2005• 19 in 2012

Trade Publications

• Specialized magazines, websites

• Typically strong business model

• Have given rise to many lay media careers

Should You Find a Niche?

• What do you obsess about?

• What do you want to be the “go-to” writer for?

Start Your Own Blog

http://skepticalscalpel.blogspot.com/

Start Your Own Blog

Getting the Word Out

• Use social media, including Twitter

• Forge relationships with other writers and editors you admire

• Don’t be afraid to toot your own horn – but also curate the best work of others

• Distinguish between personal voice and privacy

Resources

• Organizations (and training): AHCJ, NASW, SEJ

• Science writing/journalism programs: Columbia, CUNY, Hopkins, MIT, NYU, Texas A&M, UC Santa Cruz, UNC-Chapel Hill, others

• AAAS Mass Media Fellowship

• Kaiser Media Internships in Health Reporting

Contact Info/Acknowledgements

ivan-oransky@erols.com

Twitter: @ivanoransky

http://retractionwatch.com

Thanks: Nancy Lapid, Reuters Health

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