McCormack’s Nyhan Award Supports UMass Boston Undergrad Student in Public Interest Journalism

Yearly, the John W McCormack College collaborates with CLA’s Heart on Media and Society to current the David Nyhan Pupil Journalism Award, established in 2005 to honor political columnist David Nyhan. This scholarship, endowed by the Nyhan household “To assist UMass college students going into journalism careers,” honors the late Boston Globe journalist and editorial author David Nyhan, who wrote for the paper for thirty-two years.   The award acknowledges UMass Boston college students annually who show the abilities, tenacity, ethics, and temperament to serve the general public effectively as a journalist. It rewards character in addition to expertise, potential in addition to efficiency to this point. College students who win this award are anticipated to work ethically and energetically, with persistence but in addition with generosity to others.

The 2022 award went to School of Liberal Arts scholar majoring in English, Jack.  A multi-year Dean’s Listing scholar, Jack Sherman has a demonstrated curiosity and file of accomplishment in journalism, which he intends to pursue as a profession.  Jack has been a sportswriter for The Mass Media, UMass Boston’s scholar newspaper, and an adept consumer of social media. 

With the assist of the Nyhan Award, final fall Jack joined the McCormack College’s Battle Early Warning and Prevention (CEWAP) staff co-directed by Madhawa (“Mads”) Palihapitiya, Affiliate Director, Massachusetts Workplace of Public Collaboration (MOPC), and Darren Kew, Affiliate Professor of Battle Decision Human Safety and International Governance.  Mads famous, “the work of Jack Sherman has considerably elevated the early warning capability of the TRUST Community, of which I’m the Co-Chair.”   Based in October 2020, the TRUST Community seeks to stop violence, scale back division, strengthen our democracy, and deal with legacies of injustice.”  The CEWAP group works to “systematically analyze social media communications to establish language, communications methods, social media habits, recruitment and different threat elements related to people in New England and elsewhere who’ve or could turn out to be sympathetic in the direction of violent extremist (VE) teams/causes, with a view to figuring out communications and different countering violent extremism (CVE) methods that may assist stop such radicalization over time.

Reflecting on the work he has achieved with the community, Jack remarked on the methods during which his work has broadened his perspective and given him new instruments which might be a significant a part of modern journalism.  Jack remarked, “Becoming a member of the Battle Early Warning and Prevention (CEWAP) staff has been a tremendously informative expertise for me. Getting the possibility to work with my supervisor Mads (Madhawa) and so many wonderful folks on the staff allowed me to develop my horizons as a author and a researcher into difficult social phenomena. At such a pivotal second in American historical past, when divides alongside the likes of politics, faith, race, ethnicity, and others threaten the solvency of our union, the work of CEWAP is essential on the subject of figuring out doable threats to the general public and inspiring reconciliation and dialogue between completely different actors and teams.”

With the energetic stewardship and assist of David’s son, Nick Nyhan, who’s an entrepreneur dwelling in New York Metropolis, McCormack and CLA’s Heart for Media and Society will create a Nyhan-sponsored Grasp Class instructor to  will assist us attain the proper small subset of undergraduate college students; graduate college students in our public coverage and battle decision disciplines who’ve an curiosity in media to study from and community with an trade skilled by supporting college students going into journalism careers.