CELM Leadership Lab Creates Engaging Tools for New Journalists

In April, the Center for Ethical Leadership in Media (or CELM) brought experts together at the UT campus in Austin to workshop and create tools and other content for new and early-career journalists. Over a day and a half, academics and professionals brainstormed and refined their ideas, fueled by peer and student feedback. From this undertaking, five projects have been published and more are in the works. To find them all as they are added, click on “Navigating Your Career” from the main CELM webpage.

The event, which we dubbed our CELM Leadership Lab, also gave students a high-quality opportunity to share their insights and rub elbows with distinguished journalism and communications faculty as well as veteran professionals.  Attendees worked broadly in one of three groups — mental health and well-being, productivity and organizational management, and professional skills — to conceptualize and hone their creative work.

As CELM Director Dr. Kathleen McElroy explained to the group, early-career journalists need strong “soft” or interpersonal skills — like knowing how to communicate across generations and understanding constructive criticism — to thrive at work and develop into the next generation of ethical leaders.

Students were a key part of the Lab, providing research they had done in class and feedback to our experts on how their ideas might land with target audiences. Roughly 12 students attended across the event. In the future, we plan to post their research on rejection, time management, bridging the workplace generation gap and other topics.

The UT students who participated were mostly from McElroy’s undergraduate Leadership in News Organization course, which includes journalism majors and students from across campus. “They made the Lab such a rich experience for everyone by contributing research and their own tips, and by serving as ‘recipe testers’ for projects. They brought enthusiasm and honesty to everything we did,” McElroy said.

Want to get a feel for what it was like to be there? Check out our video here.

The Lab was a success on many levels. Beyond creating new and valuable content for students, it served as a forum for making new connections between professionals and academics interested in supporting early-career journalists. It also helped CELM achieve another of its goals: finding ways to reach and appeal to a broader audience. We are already beginning to think about Leadership Lab II in 2027!

In attendance (put in alphabetical order) were:

• Andy Alford, president of the board of directors of Texas Managing Editors and previous director of recruitment, training, and career development for The Texas Tribune.

• Christina Bellantoni, professor of professional practice at the University of Southern California, director of USC Annenberg’s Media Center, and an Annenberg Center on Communication Leadership and Policy faculty fellow.

• Abby Johnston, editorial director and one of the founding editors at The 19th. She has led and edited projects that won a National Murrow Award, an Online Journalism Award and that have been finalists for a National Magazine Award.

• Mira Lowe, dean of the School of Journalism & Graphic Communication at Florida A&M University, the nation’s top‑ranked public HBCU.

• Dr. Kelsey R. Mesmer, assistant professor of journalism and media in the Department of Communication at Saint Louis University. Her research focuses on hostility toward the press.

• Dr. Kaitlin C. Miller, assistant professor at the University of Alabama’s Department of Journalism and Creative Media. She has done extensive research on journalistic well‑being as it relates to hostility toward the press and mental health.

• Nick Nelson, executive vice president and Austin market lead at Edelman. He helps brands understand where they sit within the cultural landscape and how to own that role with intention, relevance and impact.

• Debra Muller Price, assistant professor of practice at Texas State University, where she leads the public relations program and teaches writing, media relations, case studies and campaigns. She is also president of PRSA Austin.

• Dr. Sayyed Fawad Ali Shah, assistant professor of journalism at Auburn University. His research advances understanding of journalists’ mental health, examining how trauma exposure and sustained occupational stress shape professional identity and long‑term career sustainability in newsrooms.

• Dr. Natalie Tindall, professor in the Stan Richards School of Advertising and Public Relations and the program director for the Communication and Leadership program at the University of Texas at Austin.

Organizers and planners for the event also included McElroy, CELM Outreach Program Coordinator Margaret Nicklas and CELM Graduate Research Assistant Jennifer Castillo Cortes, along with Barbara Allen, a Los Angeles-based journalist, trainer and consultant.