How ‘Knight Fellows’ Shape the Present and Future of Photojournalism
During decades of seismic change in media, mid-career visual journalists supported by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation returned to college to learn new skills, earn master’s degrees, and share knowledge with younger students.
A cadre of Knight Fellows, as they are called, in Visual Communication exerts leadership influence in shaping the next generation of visual storytellers through educational programs.
“If you look at who is teaching at high-end schools of visual communication, many of them have former Knight Fellows on their faculties,” says Professor Jeanie Adams-Smith at Western Kentucky University, who completed a Knight Fellowship at Ohio University a quarter-century ago.
Knight Fellows often:
- Permeate higher education including top-rated photojournalism schools producing award-winning graduates.
- Win elite competitions in design, photography, and graphics.
- Bolster top media brands such as National Geographic
Since the 1995-96 school year, 31 mid-career photojournalists, editors, and designers have completed the graduate-level Knight Fellowship at Ohio University’s School of Visual Communication. The original proposal was written by legendary photographer/educator Chuck Scott, who co-founded the School of Visual Communication in Athens, Ohio.
The incoming Knight Fellow (2025-26) is award-winning documentary photographer Rebecca Kiger of Wheeling, West Virginia, who will begin her fellowship in August. An endowment created by the Knight Foundation covers tuition and provides stipends for Knight Fellows.
Wide-ranging philanthropy of the John S. And James L. Knight Foundation supports sustaining local news, press freedoms and democracy, the arts, culture, and helping communities where the Knight brothers once published newspapers.
Beyond the Knight Foundation, other philanthropy supports photographers, filmmakers, and writers such as grants to visual storytellers from The Alexia Foundation via Syracuse University and Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellowships at the University of Michigan.
Knight Fellows’ Impact
When asked about their mid-career Knight Fellowships, former fellows commonly use the verb “pushed.”
“They (college instructors) pushed my storytelling skills to a new level,” says former Knight Fellow Annie O’Neill, now a photographer at Cleveland Clinic.
Photojournalist Jan Sonnenmair was the 2016-2017 Knight Fellow. She used her time to upgrade mid-career skills, leading a project that advanced a core industry goal: protecting journalists.
As an award-winning news photographer, Sonnenmair faced on-the-job danger. At 25, she was shot at while slogging through rice paddies in the Philippines. In hindsight, she realizes she was unprepared to document violent conflict.
As news media demand for video increased, Sonnenmair had anxiety about learning videography.
“I came from still photography,” recalls Sonnenmair, now based in Portland, Oregon. “The main value of the (2016-17) Knight Fellowship, for me, was to get comfortable with video.”
After her fellowship at Ohio University, Sonnenmair directed an award-winning documentary on the 100-plus days of unrest in Portland following the death of George Floyd in 2020 (“Between the Lines: Photojournalism in the Crossfire”).
Sonnenmair’s sobering message to photojournalists is “protect yourself.” Her film is used as a training tool — including at Ohio University — to prepare students who may be assigned to cover conflict.
Like most of the Knight Fellows, Sonnenmair is an educator; she speaks at journalism schools and has taught at the college level.
A more recent Knight Fellow, Jim Koenigsaeker (2023-2024), is documenting World Heritage Sites as part of a long-term personal project. His most recent documentary film is “Voyage of the Handala” (2025) about a flotilla sailing from Europe to Gaza to deliver aid.
Knight Fellows = Big Footprint in Education
Leading college programs employ former Knight Fellows on their faculties including 1992 Pulitzer Prize winner John Kaplan, who taught at University of Florida for 22 years.
In 2019, Kaplan was asked to join the Nobel Laureates Forum Lectureship series held in China, the first non-Nobel Prize winner invited.
Former Knight Fellow Lynn Johnson, who taught a mentoring-based program for master’s students at Syracuse University for five years, continues to do workshops for National Geographic worldwide.
Award-winning filmmaker and National Geographic Explorer Matt Moyer teaches at National Geographic Photo Camps and serves on the Board of Advisors for The Siena School in Washington, DC.
Photojournalist Kathleen Hennessy, an early recruit to the Knight program, has taught at several colleges in California. She attributes her mid-career stint as a Knight Fellow to giving her confidence and credibility as a manager at the San Francisco Chronicle, and in helping win a Pulitzer Prize. (Deanne Fitzmaurice of the Chronicle won a 2005 Pulitzer Prize for her photo essay on an Oakland hospital’s effort to mend an Iraqi boy nearly killed by an explosion).
“One of my goals as a Knight Fellow was to learn how to teach at the college level,” says photojournalist Karen Kasmauski, a Knight Fellow during the 2010-11 academic year. As an educator, Kasmauski leads photography tours for National Geographic and other clients in locations ranging from Antarctica to New Guinea to the Galapagos. She teaches classes on video storytelling, photojournalism, and news writing at George Washington University, The Corcoran School of Art, and George Mason University. She frequently speaks to corporate and non-profit organizations on global health issues.
During two decades as a National Geographic photographer, Kasmauski produced 25 major stories for the magazine on topics including human migration, viruses, aging, and genetics. Most were based on ideas that she originated and proposed.
University of Florida alumnus Tom Burton knew he wanted to teach. After 30-plus years on the photo staff of The Orlando Sentinel and editing for the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA), Burton applied for a Knight Fellowship (2018-19) to get a master’s degree.
“I learned how excellent teachers teach,” he recalls. “I know better how to support students while challenging them.”
After her Knight Fellowship, Jenn Poggi joined the White House photo staff and now teaches at Rochester Institute of Technology where she is director of undergraduate photojournalism.
Pulitzer Prize winner Pat Davison has been teaching at the University of North Carolina since 2001, after his Knight Fellowship. Davison has produced 25-plus student team multimedia projects, winning recognition via Webby Awards, South by Southwest, Pictures of the Year International, Hearst Journalism Awards, and more.
Former Knight Fellow Bruce Strong served for 10 years as chair of the Visual Communications department at the Newhouse School of Public Communication at Syracuse University. Strong lectures, most notably at the Pingyao Photography Festival in Pingyao, China. He leads workshops for a variety of groups, including the National Press Photographers Association’s Multimedia Immersion Workshop, IEI Media in Valencia, Spain, the Maine Media Workshops, and the Eddie Adams Workshop.
Three faculty members at Ohio University completed Knight Fellowships. Professor Stan Alost was a Knight Fellow three decades ago. Professor Timothy Goheen (2005-2006) is director of the School of Visual Communication. Associate Professor Adonis Durado (2017-2018) is an internationally recognized designer and author. He received the President’s Award from the Society of News Design in 2017.
Knight Fellow Sue Morrow (2010-2011) is an adjunct instructor in the School of Visual Communication at Ohio University. A newsroom leader for more than 30 years and editor for the NPPA, Morrow served as faculty advisor for the NPPA Student Chapter. She is faculty and a board member of The Kalish visual editing workshop at Rochester Institute of Technology since 1994.
Western Kentucky University’s Professor Adams-Smith (Knight Fellow 1999-2000) was named Kentucky Photographer of the Year in 2006. With experience as a photo editor at the Chicago Tribune, she joined the award-winning faculty of WKU, which has shepherded numerous Hearst titles for top-tier students.
In 2020, Adams-Smith received the NPPA’s Robin F. Garlands Educator Award, recognizing outstanding teaching talent in the field of visual communication. Former Knight Fellow Bruce Strong won this honor in 2010.
The Next Generation of Photojournalists
Students at schools staffed by former Knight Fellows are hired by leading news outlets. On June 17, The New York Times announced its hiring of photojournalist Haiyun Jiang to its Washington, DC bureau. She graduated from Ohio University in 2022 with a graduate degree.
The 2015 Hearst Photojournalism Champion, UNC alumna Carolyn Van Houten, won the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Journalism along with colleagues at The Washington Post. The printed edition of The Washington Post on Sunday, June 29, featured photos by Van Houten on its front page and travel section.
The Big Picture
Knight Fellows continue to document news and daily life, such as stellar sports images made by award-winning photographer Matt Gade in South Dakota (2020-2021 Knight Fellow).
The lens of the Knight Fellowship in Visual Communication extends beyond camera bodies and the U.S. border.
Photojournalist Sankha Kar, from the Bengali region of India, recently completed a Knight Fellowship and received a master’s degree from Ohio University.
As a 2024-2025 Knight Fellow, Kar’s master’s project was to figure out how to prompt generative artificial intelligence to accurately illustrate a classic story of a mute Bengali village girl (Subha) written in 1892.
The chair of Kar’s graduate school committee at Ohio University was faculty member/designer Adonis Durado, a 2017-2018 Knight Fellow from the Philippines.
“This master’s thesis in applied generative AI may be one of the first of its kind globally,” says Durado.
And, another first for former Knight Fellow Durado: he taught a course in generative AI during the spring semester.
About the author: Ken Klein lives in Silver Spring, Maryland; he is retired after a career in politics, lobbying, and media including The Associated Press and Gannett in Florida. Klein is an alumnus of Ohio University and a member of the Dean’s Advisory Council of the Scripps College of Communication. Professionally, he has worked for Fort Myers News-Press (Gannett), The Associated Press (Tallahassee), Senator Bob Graham, and the Outdoor Advertising Association of America (OAAA).
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