Awarding fellowships to journalists to pursue independent projects of significant interest and skepticism that will benefit the public.
Apply for a Fellowship
Applications are now open for independent writing projects funded by the Alicia Patterson Foundation. The fellowship grants, either 12 months ($40,000) or 6 month ($20,000), allow you to do independent research and writing on a topic of your choosing. At least one fellowship is aimed at science and environmental coverage. Your application must be completed by October 1.
Please send in your application early – Early submissions are much appreciated.
2025 Fellows
60th Annual Fellowship Winners
Apply for a Fellowship
Applications are now open for independent writing projects funded by the Alicia Patterson Foundation. The fellowship grants, either 12 months ($40,000) or 6 month ($20,000), allow you to do independent research and writing on a topic of your choosing. At least one fellowship is aimed at science and environmental coverage.
Alicia Patterson
Alicia Patterson reluctantly became a newspaper publisher in 1940. Her husband wanted to keep her busy and she wanted to show her accomplished father that she could be as good a journalist as he was. From that timid start she created Newsday, the most successful new daily newspaper of the postwar period.
Our Mission
To promote and sustain the best traditions of American journalism, the Alicia Patterson Foundation supports journalists engaged in rigorous, probing, in-depth reporting. Through its fellowships, the foundation works to foster a community of independent journalists committed to informing the public truthfully on significant issues around the world.
Donate
For over five decades, the Alicia Patterson Foundation has been giving top journalists the time away from daily deadlines to pursue stories of significance that have changed policies, illuminated problems and educated the public. The cost of in-depth reporting and the shrinking size of newsrooms has made the support of APF even more critical for an informed society.
Current Fellows 2025
Rania Abouzeid
Freelance journalist
Beirut, Lebanon
“The Past is Always Present: From the Killing Fields of Iraq to the Search for Solutions to Climate Change in Europe”
Carrie Arnold
Freelance journalist
Williamsburg, VA
“When Public Health Crises Collide: Kidney Disease, Dialysis and the Coming Climate Disaster”
Josh Fine
Freelance journalist
Brooklyn, NY
“How Gulf Money is Transforming Sports”
Andrew Green
Freelance journalist
Berlin, Germany
“As the U.S. Retreats from Global HIV Aid, Does It Owe Life-Long Medicines to Those It Saved?”
Cornelia Grumman
Freelance journalist
Chicago, IL
“The Challenges of Delivering Quality Early Education: One Center’s Odyssey”
Tina Vasquez
Features editor, Prism
Winston-Salem, NC
“Migrant Abuses in the H-2A Program”
Christine Peterson
Freelance journalist
Laramie, WY
“The Race to Save Amphibians From Extinction”
Ashley Stimpson
Freelance journalists
Columbia MD
Nate Rosenfield
New York Times’ local investigations fellow
Brooklyn, NY
“Investigating Police Torture in the South”
Brian Howey
New York Times’ local investigations fellows
Oakland, CA
Unlocking the Gates: How the North Led Housing Discrimination in America
Original release: February 12 2025 In this gripping follow-up to his award-winning podcast What Happened in Alabama?, Alicia Patterson Fellow Lee Hawkins exposes how Northern developers, brokers and legislators engineered a nationwide system of housing apartheid. Drawing on newly unearthed deeds, newspaper
Opinion | Are Embryos Property or People? Even the Courts Don’t Know
OPINION Are Embryos Property? Human Life? Neither? The Embryo Question is a three-part series about the cluster of cells at the crossroads of science, ethics and the law. Read the introduction. Between divorce cases and I.V.F. disputes, the frozen
The Coyote Next Door
What urban wildlife can teach us about cognition, survival and how to be good neighbors. Standing in a thicket of poplars, surrounded by tangled brush and magpie chatter, there’s an air of wilderness. But reminders of the urban world beyond
Opinion: Mexico’s new president should tackle the country’s festering human rights catastrophe
New President Claudia Sheinbaum can do more than her predecessor to resolve the disappearances and murders of Mexicans by gangs and past governments. (Fernando Llano / Associated Press) Every morning when I walk to the park across from my apartment
How Heavy Rains and High Tides Hurt Nyc’s Black and Brown Neighborhoods
Normally, Estefani Nuñez parks the small yellow school bus she drives each day by the side of her home in the Rosedale neighborhood in Queens. On the day before she knows it’s going to rain, she parks her school bus
A climate change forecast: rain with a chance of mosquito-borne diseases
Decades before Elizabeth Blaney, now 84, moved to St. Albans, the neighborhood was shaded yellow on maps made by the federal government. The color yellow could mean there was a high number of immigrants—or that there was a possibility of
How Robots Helped My Parents’ Dementia
Forget the crappy caregiver bots and puppy-eyed seals. When my parents got sick, I turned to a new generation of roboticists—and their glowing, talking, blobby creations. This article first appeared in the January, 2024 edition of Wired. Her research was
The Allure and Dangers of Experimenting With Brain-Dead Bodies
For scientists who perform medical research on the recently deceased, there are few regulatory or ethical guardrails. This article, written by Jyoti Madhusoodanan, is based on her 2023 Alicia Patterson Foundation fellowship research on human experiments and greater openness behind
In Kosovo, War Survivors Turned Homes Into Their Own Museums
This article, by APF fellow Nina Strochlic, first appeared in the Washington Post on February 21, 2024. It was supported by her research for her APF fellowship. POKLEK, Kosovo — Fadil Muqolli has spent more than two decades trying to
A Country Shaped By Poetry
This article, by APF fellow Nina Strochlic, first appeared in the Noēma Magazine on February 21, 2024. It was supported by her research for her APF fellowship. Hargeysa, the capital city of Somaliland. (Mustafa Saeed/Noema Magazine) Somaliland’s poets have toppled
How a controversial US drug policy could be harming cancer patients worldwide
Illustration by Karol Banach In August 2021, Amol Akhade, an oncologist at Nair Medical Hospital in Mumbai, India, received an e-mail from the Swiss drug manufacturer Roche recommending the use of a drug named atezolizumab to treat a specific kind
US push to turn farm manure into renewable energy draws concerns
AMES, IOWA – In a gathering that drew the attendance of both farmers and Wall Street financiers, US regulators joined with oil giant Chevron at a November conference here to promote what backers promise will be a monumental breakthrough –
Opinion | Are Embryos Property or People? Even the Courts Don’t Know
The Coyote Next Door
How Robots Helped My Parents’ Dementia
The Allure and Dangers of Experimenting With Brain-Dead Bodies
In Kosovo, War Survivors Turned Homes Into Their Own Museums
A Country Shaped By Poetry
How a controversial US drug policy could be harming cancer patients worldwide