Ballinteer man wins top UK award for leadership of journalism education internationally

A Ballinteer man has received the most prestigious UK honour for his leadership of journalism education internationally.

Dr Colm Murphy was awarded the prestigious National Teaching Fellowship for his pioneering work in journalism education that has helped transform training in the profession in the UK and is having an impact internationally.

Only 54 of these awards are made each year by the UK’s Higher Education Academy and they recognise excellence in higher education teaching.

The award is on top of two others he has won in the last 14 months for his work in journalism education including being made a Principal Fellows of the UK’s Higher Education Academy and Ulster University’s Sustained Teaching Excellence Award.

Colm said: “I have always had a passion for journalism and making sure the next generation has the skills, resilience and education they need to ensure the public has access to a fair, free and robust news  has been my priority.”

Colm’s interest in journalism began at Our Lady’s primary school in Ballinteer when he set-up a comic and he then co-founded the D16 magazine at Ballinteer Community School.

He then worked in south Dublin local newspaper, Southside, before joining The Sunday Tribune where he was its youngest ever business editor.

An award-winning journalist, he then worked with The Sunday Times as well as producing investigative documentaries for RTE. He has also written several investigative books.

He also set-up and ran news bureaus in Russia, Israel, Poland, India and Turkey when working for an international news agency.

He is now based in Northern Ireland and is subject leader in media at Ulster University and director of the UK’s National Council for the Training of Journalists, which accredits journalism training in 40 universities and further education centres in the UK. He chairs its education group and international strategy group and he developed the first internationally accredited training standard for journalists.

He has helped raise over €20m in the UK towards scholarships and training to encourage diversification of the workforce.

He also won a national teaching innovation award for developing new techniques for training journalists who work in dangerous environments internationally.

He has been sponsored by UNESCO and the World Journalism Education Council to use these techniques in the world’s trouble spots like Gaza, Beirut, Kashmir, Pakistan and Egypt.