College Park, MD – Registration is now open for the inaugural NewsVision conference (www.newsvision.org), a day-long symposium designed for journalists and media managers from all platforms and levels of digital fluency. NewsVision will offer critical insights and success stories from leading practitioners of digital news in this period of transformational change for the media industry.

Organized by the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism, the conference is sponsored by The Newspaper Guild-CWA and the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism, in partnership with the Online News Association. The March 30, 2009 event will be held at the Knight Conference Center at the Newseum in Washington, D.C.

NVision 2009 is the first in a series of annual gatherings of some of the nation’s top journalists from digital and traditional media. It provides an opportunity for journalists to come together and take stock of the industry today, discuss where it is heading, and debate ways to strengthen its future.

The symposium will feature several national leaders in digital media : Vivian Schiller, president and CEO of National Public Radio and John Harris, co-founder and editor in chief of Politico, will be the keynote speakers. NBC Nightly News Digital Correspondent Mara Schiavocampo will discuss backpack journalism. Other speakers include: Eduardo Hauser, CEO of DailyMe; Scott Karp, CEO of Publish 2; Tom Kennedy, managing editor for multimedia at washingtonpost.com; Liddy Manson, CEO of DigitalSports; John Poole, video producer at NPR; Adam Riggs, president of Shutterstock; Ju-Don Marshall Roberts, managing editor of washingtonpost.com; Jason Seiken, senior vice president interactive at PBS; and Craig Stoltz, blogger and digital strategy consultant.

Panel and session topics include:

• New research data about multimedia journalism skills and job types
• Skill sets and career paths for Internet journalists
• Web video — where TV, radio and print reporters converge
• Social media tools applied to news
• Backpack Journalism and best practices for operating under merged job expectations
• CEO panel on Internet revenue models
• Keynote addresses on success stories

The $75 registration charge covers access to the panels and keynotes, as well as the luncheon and snacks by Wolfgang Puck Caterers. Participants who reserve before March 6 will save $10 off the registration charge.

The sessions begin at 8 a.m. with registration and coffee, and will conclude at 5 p.m. The complete schedule, registration options and speaker bios are available online at www.newsvision.org.

About the partners:

The Newspaper Guild-CWA
Founded as a print journalists’ union, the Guild today is a media union whose members are diverse in their occupations, but who share the view that the best working conditions are achieved by people who have a say in their workplace. It now has more than 34,000 members in the United States, Canada and in Puerto Rico, and who are journalists, sales and media workers of all kinds. Its members are from the myriad communication media: wire services, newspapers, magazines, labor information services, broadcast news, public service and dot com companies.

Knight Center for Specialized Journalism
The Knight Center for Specialized Journalism is in its 21st year as a professional outreach center at the University of Maryland. Funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Knight Center offers free top-quality seminars for print, broadcast and online reporters, editors and editorial writers. At Knight Center seminars, journalists receive in-depth training in subjects related to their coverage — law, health, science, society, demographics, national and international affairs. Participants meet like-minded colleagues, get grounded in a new assignment or rekindle enthusiasm for a long-time beat. And results last, as Knight Fellows gain new sources, valuable reference materials and many story ideas. Since its inception in 1987, more than 2,700 fellowships have been awarded to journalists from nearly 500 news organizations.

The Online News Association
The Online News Association is comprised of 1,700 digital journalists whose principal livelihood involves gathering or producing news for digital presentation. The membership includes news writers, producers, designers, editors, photographers, technologists and others who produce news for the Internet or other digital delivery systems, as well as academic members, students and others interested in the development of online journalism. ONA also sponsors an annual conference focusing on the latest in journalism and technology and administers the prestigious Online Journalism Awards.

The Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland
The Merrill College is widely regarded as one of the best schools of journalism in the country. It offers educational programs on the undergraduate, graduate and professional level, with a heavy focus on public affairs journalism on all platforms. Merrill is a member school of the Carnegie-Knight Initiative on the Future of Journalism education, often referred to as the “digital ivy league.” It operates several professional outreach programs from its College Park, Md., headquarters, including American Journalism Review, the Knight Center, the Journalism Center for Children and Families and serves as the headquarters for the National Association of Black Journalists and the American Association of Sunday and Feature Editors.

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Media Contact: Matt Sheehan, Director of Public Affairs; Philip Merrill College of Journalism; (301) 405-8320