Dr. Ginny Whitehouse, a professor in the newly created multimedia news program in the Department of Communication at Eastern Kentucky University, has received a Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program grant to Bulgaria in the field of journalism from the U.S. Department of State and the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.
Whitehouse will lecture at Sofia University in Spring 2018 as part of a project titled Empowering Journalists. She will teach public affairs reporting, media ethics and media law, building on more than 20 years of experience in journalism education. Currently, her EKU students are collaborating with The Richmond Register in an innovative pilot to enhance public affairs and social media reporting. Whitehouse researches media ethics, particularly concerning privacy and social media. She is the Cases and Commentaries editor for the Journal of Mass Media Ethics and serves on the journal’s editorial board.
Previously, she chaired the Media Ethics Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication and the National Journalism Education Committee for the Society of Professional Journalists. She earned both her master’s and doctorate from the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Journalism, and served a journalist for newspapers in Tennessee and Alabama, as well as for a religion news service in Southeast Asia.
Whitehouse is one of more than 1,200 U.S. citizens who will teach, conduct research and provide expertise abroad for the 2017-18 academic year through the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program. Recipients of Fulbright awards are selected on the basis of academic and professional achievement, as well as record of service and demonstrated leadership in their respective fields.
The Fulbright program is the flagship international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S. government and is designed to build relations between the people of the United States and the people of other countries that are needed to solve global challenges. The program is funded through an annual appropriation made by the U.S. Congress to the U.S. Department of State. Participating governments and host institutions, corporations and foundations around the world also provide direct and indirect support to the program, which operates in more than 160 countries worldwide.
Last year marked the 70th anniversary of the Fulbright program’s establishment in 1946 under legislation introduced by U.S. Senator J. William Fulbright of Arkansas. Since then, the program has given more than 370,000 students, scholars, teachers, artists and scientists the opportunity to study, teach and conduct research, exchange ideas and contribute to finding solutions to shared international concerns.
Fulbright Scholars address critical global challenges – from sustainable energy and climate change to public health and food security – in all areas, while building relationships, knowledge and leadership in support of the long-term interests of the United States and the world. Fulbright alumni have achieved distinction in many fields; 54 have been awarded the Nobel Prize, and 82 have received Pulitzer Prizes.
For more information about the Fulbright program or the U.S. Department of State, visit eca.state.gov/fulbright or contact the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs Press Office, 202-632-6452 or ECA-Press@state.gov.