Dear Sir/Madam,
Subject: Senior Fellowship for mental health reporting for journalists with 5 and more years of experience

Greetings from SCARF!

Schizophrenia Research Foundation (SCARF) in Chennai , an NGO working in the field of mental health for over 3 decades (www.scarfindia.org) and a Goa-headquartered NGO Sangath (www.sangath.org) are happy to offer fellowships for a period of 12 months for senior journalists (those with 5 years or more experience in reporting). The fellowships are open to print and on-line Indian journalists working with Hindi and English national newspapers.

This fellowship is part of a NIH funded project ESSENCE (Enabling translation of Science to Service to ENhance Depression CarE), which aims to bridge the gap between Science and Service delivery in India and the neighbouring countries of Nepal, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.

We urge you to encourage senior journalists from your media house to apply for the fellowship. Please find appended some features of the Fellowship.

Applications can be sent to mangala@localhost. For clarifications if any, please feel free to write to us or call Dr R. Mangala on +91-9444027388.

Looking forward to your active participation

Dr R Thara
Vice Chairman, SCARF & CO-PI ESSENCE

Features of the Fellowship

  1. This is a part time fellowship and will require approximately 20% of the fellow’s time during the tenure which comes with a fellowship honorarium amount of  Rs.50, 000/- per fellow for the entire duration of the fellowship (one year).
  2. Journalists who are in regular employment with media houses are eligible to apply. The tenure of the fellowship is 12 months.
  3. The fellows will have a 2 day face to face orientation program at the beginning of the tenure at SCARF, Chennai.
    • The fellows will have to publish a minimum of 4 articles during their fellowship.
    • The stories should be well researched original articles on mental health and should not be news reporting. Stories can focus on policies, mental health budgets, infrastructure, service delivery, laws and legislations, institutions, innovations, research etc. Human interest stories can be part of their stories.
    • There will be 3 senior fellowships every year, for 3 years, open to national level newspapers and magazines, two in English and one in Hindi. This current call is for the fellowship period of 2020-21.
    • All fellows who complete their tenure satisfactorily will receive a certificate from SCARF/ESSENCE.
    • Successful fellows can continue to engage with SCARF/ESSENCE as mentors for the fellows of the subsequent years.

Eligible Applicants

Applicants must:

  • Be Indian nationals,
  • Have completed (undergraduate) graduation or master’s degree in media studies, journalism,
  • Has a minimum of 5 years of experience as journalist in print/online media. Experience in health /mental health reporting is desirable but not mandatory.
  • Must be currently working as journalist in print /online media.
  • The employers should commit to release 20% of the employee’s time for the fellowship and undertake to publish the stories written in the course of the fellowship.
  • Proof of current employment status (i.e., employed), letter of support, and with 1 year of employment commitment from the employers.