SABEW receives $25,000 grant for ethics

The Society of American Business Editors and Writers has been awarded $25,000 from the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation to launch several ethics-based initiatives.

The grant is the second awarded this year to SABEW from the Oklahoma City-based journalism foundation. In May, the group received a challenge grant funded by Ethics and Excellence as well as the James L. and John S. Knight Foundation, and the Ford Foundation. That grant provides for up to $25,000 in one-to-one matching funds raised by SABEW before May 31, 2007.

The latest grant will help launch a re-examination of ethical consideration that today’s business journalists face. Planned initiatives include workshop seminars, publications and web content.

“SABEW has long played a leading role in terms of ethics in business journalism, and this grant will help augment our efforts on that front,” said SABEW President Dave Kansas, Money and Investing editor for the Wall Street Journal. “It’s more important than ever for journalists to operate with the highest level of ethics, and we’re dedicated to that mission.”

SABEW was founded in 1964 to improve the ethics and professionalism of business reporters. The organization has 3,200 professional members who are primarily working journalists in the U.S. or Canada.

Martha Steffens, the SABEW Chair in Business and Financial Journalism at the University of Missouri, said the grant helps SABEW to update its ethics code in light of changing technology and changing pressures on financial journalists.

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