A School for the New Century   

An entrepreneur makes a major investment in journalism's future.

FOR THOSE OF US WHO dwell in and around Washington, a cold early winter has given way to the warmth, and the fresh hope, of an early spring. A new administration came roaring into town like a Texas gale. Unlike some had predicted--I won't, ahem, mention any names--George W. Bush took the oath of office flawlessly. He went on to give what I thought was an eloquent inaugural speech, and pretty much ever since he's been doing his best to make the nation forget the chads of December.
Out here in Greater College Park, meantime, we've managed to make a little news ourselves. On a recent sunny afternoon we gathered our faculty, staff, students and friends for a christening: We became, officially and in perpetuity, the Philip Merrill College of Journalism. It was a tribute bestowed on Phil by Maryland's Board of Regents in recognition of his magnificent $10 million gift to the college--the first eight-figure check, I'm almost sure, anyone has ever handed me.
Phil Merrill is owner-publisher of Washingtonian magazine, an institution as enduring as the Smithsonian, as well as the Capital newspaper in Annapolis, one of the most influential small dailies in the nation. For nearly two decades he and his wife, Eleanor, have been involved with the J-school, giving of their time, energy and purse to help its steady rise to national prominence. Ellie has been a member of our Board of Visitors since its inception in 1983, and its chair since 1995.
Being such good friends of the college, Phil and Ellie recognized that it had arrived at a propitious moment in its history. They believe, as do I, that this generous gift will be the engine that drives us to our longstanding goal--achieving a level of excellence unsurpassed by any other journalism program in the world. Over the next decade or so, nearly $4 million of the Merrill money will fund badly needed scholarships, fellowships and assistantships. Another million or more will help us acquire and maintain the pricey toys that modern journalism schools require--powerful computers, digital cameras, state-of-the-art editing machines. And because a great program starts with a great faculty, much of the rest of the gift will underwrite three new Merrill Chairs in Journalism.
In fact, no sooner did we unveil the Merrill gift than we were able to announce the appointment of the first Merrill Chair--two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Jon Franklin, the highly respected science writer and author of one of our field's most authoritative texts, ³Writing for Story.² Jon's appointment is exciting for us on so many levels, as he is an alum of the College, won both his Pulitzers while working at Baltimore's Evening Sun and once before belonged to our faculty. We also aim to use Jon as the focal point for a new center devoted to the communication of science, an interdisciplinary initiative with the University of Maryland's remarkable science units.
In recent weeks we've also been privileged to announce the addition to our faculty of the most respected political reporter of our time--and to my mind, a national treasure--David Broder of the Washington Post. A tireless reporter, David is also a columnist of rare wisdom and civility. He'll begin teaching this fall, with an emphasis on political reporting and the impact of the press on public policy.
Jon and David grace a faculty that already is the envy of journalism education. We've collected a mix of gifted practitioners--e.g., seminal newspaper editor Gene Roberts; Pulitzer winner and Knight Chair Haynes Johnson; our Richard Eaton Chair in broadcast journalism, Lee Thornton; and Carl Sessions Stepp, voted the nation's journalism educator of the year in 1999--and such internationally acclaimed scholar-researchers as Maurine Beasley, Michael Gurevitch and Douglas Gomery.
Pack that kind of talent into a smallish program (about 525 undergraduate and 70 grad students) that focuses only on journalism (no advertising, public relations or speech sequences), and you can appreciate why we think this place is something special. Maryland is shaping some of the best new journalists around at a time when we need as many as we can get.
"I'm an entrepreneur," Phil Merrill explained on that lovely afternoon outside the college that now bears his name. "I see an opportunity here to take this school to where it is the very best. I can't resist that kind of investment. It's not an investment for a return of capital; it's an investment for a return of excellence."
Know that we will be good stewards of that investment, Phil. And know that the public will be reaping its dividends for decades to come, just as you intended.