Cologne School of Journalism

Cologne journalism school for politics and business
legal form	registered association
founding	1968
Seat	Cologne
main emphasis	Journalism training
Chair	Bernd Ziesemer
Members	60
Website	koelnerjournalistenschule.de

The Cologne School of Journalism trains journalists with a focus on politics and economics. It is one of the most renowned journalism schools in Germany. The school is independent of publishers and is supported by a non-profit association.

The seat of the school in Cologne's Mediapark

education

The training lasts four years. At the same time as the journalism school, a bachelor's degree in economics , business administration or social sciences (politics) is required at the University of Cologne . The first year of training is about the basics of journalism and local journalism. The students have one semester full-time tuition with a high practical component including an eight-week internship in a local editorial office . From the second semester onwards, the students study parallel to their journalistic training at the University of Cologne. At the school, they attend seminars on topics such as reporting , company reporting or tri-media production (creating articles for print, radio and television). The focus is on print and online journalism, plus training in radio and video journalism. In the teaching department, the journalism students produce articles for national media, for example for the FAZ , the WDR or the Handelsblatt . Another four internships are part of the training (local journalism II, online, business and political editing).

Admission procedure

The maximum age at which prospective journalism students can be admitted is 25 years. Anyone interested can submit a written application until June 15th (earlier May 31st, previously March 31st). It consists of a résumé and an essay on "Why I want to be a journalist". The 50 best applicants will be invited to Cologne for a two-day qualification test. There are six tests in these two days: information test, verbalization of statistical data, news exercise, commentary exercise, reportage exercise, and job interview.

The tests are evaluated independently of one another and the results of each applicant are graded according to the weighting of the individual parts. As a rule, the 20 best are accepted. On average, around 100 applicants take part in the first stage of the selection process and 50 in the second.

financing

The school is financed by its own account mainly through tuition fees (one third of the total income) as well as donations and sponsoring (another 50 percent). The tuition fees are based on the parental income and range between 0 euros (up to 40,000 euros gross parental income) and 2,000 euros per semester (from 69,000 euros gross parental income). The parents' income does not play a role in the decision on admission to the school (it is only queried after the interested parties have received their acceptance for the school). The school's sponsors are mainly large companies, which are clearly visible on the homepage. In return for their commitment, sponsors are given the opportunity to present their company to the students. This idea is always embedded in a seminar on the relevant industry, the content and the lecturers of the seminar are determined solely by the school. A smaller portion of the income (25,000 euros per year) comes from the state of North Rhine-Westphalia . The school generates additional income by participating in the fees for the articles written by the students in the teaching staff and published by the media. The school also generates income through the membership fees of the supporting association, its own journalistic or PR assignments and seminars with partners.

history

The journalism school was founded as the Cologne School, Institute for Journalism . Even today it is often called the Cologne School for short (KS). The non-profit association that runs the journalism school was founded on November 23, 1968 on the premises of the Institute for Comparative Social Research at the University of Cologne . The founding members were Hilmar S. Ankerstein (chairman of the Cologne Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation), Gerd Grützmacher , Ingeborg Hilgert (former head of the school), the journalist Hans-Götz Oxenius , the sociologist Erwin Scheuch , the theologian Dorothee Sölle and Heinz D. Stuckmann , who became the first headmaster and remained so until 1994. Stuckmann left school after it became known that he had worked for the Stasi until the fall of the Berlin Wall . Ingeborg Hilgert took over the school management in 1994. Günther Ludwig was managing director from September 2009 to mid-2015. Former manager magazine journalist Ulric Papendick has held this position since he retired .

Graduates

Since 2000, the alumni of the Cologne School of Journalism have organized their own alumni association, the "KS Club". It now has more than 200 members, runs its own job newsletter for journalists, organizes regular alumni meetings and awards the ergo prize for young journalists from the Cologne School of Journalism.

The school has produced many renowned journalists and outreach workers including:

Michael Bauchmüller , Berlin correspondent for the Süddeutsche Zeitung

Holger Beckmann , presenter at WDR 5 Current Affairs

Patrick Bernau , editor responsible for Business Online at FAZ

Ruth Camilla Berschens , Brussels office manager at Handelsblatt