Join the ranks of the journalism industry’s most revered professionals by launching your career as an investigative journalist. The Media School’s M.S. concentration in journalism offers specialized training in watchdog reporting with hands-on opportunities to produce meaningful public service journalism as a fellow in the Michael I. Arnolt Center for Investigative Journalism.
This program focuses on multiplatform investigative reporting, including courses in data analysis, visual communication and media law.
See concentration requirementsDescription of the video:
IU campus shots roll, beginning with the Sample Gates and Franklin Hall.
Gerry Lanosga, associate professor, The Media School, speaking to the camera: We decided to create a degree that has a focus specifically on investigative journalism because it's often considered to be the most important form of journalism. It's the journalism that on an episodic basis tends to hold power to account.
Students appear in a studio as anchors and in classrooms.
Lanosga: And in the creation of the Arnolt Center — the Arnolt Center for Investigative Journalism here at IU, we wanted to have students both working on investigative projects and also learning about how to do investigative reporting as the backbone of that degree.
Students listen to a lecture in a classroom.
Noah Harrison, M.S. journalism student speaks to the camera.
Harrison: One of the main things that really drew me to IU was the fact that nothing is really off limits. You can learn whatever you want to learn here and leave prepared, feeling prepared to, where you can do that in a real world too.
Kathleen Johnston, director of the Arnolt Center, speaks to the camera.
Johnston: Graduate students who enroll for this master's program spend one-third of their two-year program in the center. So it's a great way to be in the middle of investigative reporting while you're earning a degree. And we set up our newsrooms that I act as the editor. Then we make the graduate students, we asked them to be our sort of our assistant city editors, so that we have information flowing from the teams that they are on flowing to them so they can report weekly to our partners.
Students appear in a classroom while Johnston lectures.
Harrison speaks to he camera: So now I have opportunities, I have job offers to be a multimedia journalist in two different stations and an opportunity to be a weekend anchor at one station. You get to build crazy connections that I would have otherwise not had no matter what I threw out — "Yeah. We can do that for you too. Yeah. You can learn that too." There was nothing off limits. And honestly, since I've been here with my degree program, it's been the exact same way.
Campus shots roll beginning with a focus on the Sample Gates facing Kirkwood
Harrison: Anything that I want to do, I can do.
Black screen. Text: Indiana University. Mediaschool.indiana.edu
You'll learn the history, philosophy and methodology of investigative reporting, including techniques for developing sources and obtaining and analyzing public information.
Master the advanced skills you'll need for your Arnolt Center practicum: sourcing, records requests, fact checking and more.
Master journalistic visual communication skills and learn to craft a compelling story through photography, design and video.
Dive into social science principles like measurement, sampling, statistical inferences, research design and more, applying those concepts and their scientific viewpoints to the field of journalism.
Your two years in the program will look something like the chart shown below. Tailor your degree to your own interests with elective courses. (*Course fulfills concentration requirement.)
| Semester 1 | Semester 2 | Semester 3 | Semester 4 |
|---|---|---|---|
| J510* Media and Society Seminar | J575* Arnolt Center Practicum | J575* Arnolt Center Practicum | M699* Master's Capstone Project (6 credits) |
| J577* Investigative Reporting | Media School elective | External elective | Media School elective (can be J575) |
| J575* Arnolt Center Practicum | - | - | - |
Center
The Michael I. Arnolt Center for Investigative Journalism teaches and produces top-tier investigative journalism covering the state of Indiana and beyond. As a student in the journalism M.S. concentration, you’ll earn 9–12 credit hours working as a fellow in the center.
Learn more about the Arnolt CenterStudents in The Media School’s Arnolt Center for Investigative Journalism investigated where Big Ten schools have spent millions in severance payments for football and men's basketball coach.
Read the complete story
Media School faculty are award-winning industry veterans as well as media scholars. M.S. journalism professors include former journalists from CNN, Reuters, the Associated Press, the Tampa Bay Times and other prominent news organizations who have won prestigious national awards such as the Pulitzer Prize and the Peabody Award.
Meet Media School facultyMedia School faculty will help you launch your career. Your work in this concentration will set you apart with in-demand skills. Plus, you’ll make professional connections by working with the partner organizations of the Arnolt Center.
Whether you apply your skills at a newspaper, television station, website or documentary production company, you’ll be trained to produce thoughtful, thorough and ethical journalism.
I landed my dream job thanks to the M.S. program in The Media School.
Daniela Molina, MS'21, investigative producer at Gray Television
