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Renewed support for the Korea- United States Journalists Exchange.


In November 2008, the Luce Foundation’s Directors approved a three-year grant to the East-West Center in Honolulu, Hawai’i as renewed support for the Korea-United States Journalists Exchange. Funding from the Foundation supports participation in the program of American journalists representing print, broadcast and online news services.

The Korea Press Foundation, a non-profit organization based in Seoul whose activities include journalism training and exchanges, provides matching support for Korean journalists.

To date, 40 journalists (20 from each country) have learned about each other’s societies, economies and histories, and have explored interests that bind the two countries as well as issues that have strained the bilateral relationship. Their itineraries, arranged by the Korea Press Foundation in South Korea and the East-West Center in the U.S., provide opportunities to visit rural areas as well as cities and to listen to a variety of perspectives, from government officials to ordinary citizens. Americans have also visited Mount Kumgang and Kaesong in North Korea. The following excerpt from the East-West Center’s 2007 report highlights a trip by the Korean journalists to Nebraska.

The trip included a visit to a family farm in Gretna, “whose success relies on the latest high-tech farming methods. After tromping through fields, the Koreans visited a livestock feed yard, where the only female feed yard manager in the state, Mary Meister, came galloping in on her horse. They also met an intern ‘cowboy,’ a Somalian refugee placed there by the International Center of the Heartland, part of Lutheran Family Services. Journalists had visited this organization the previous day to learn about services to refugees and immigrants in the state. They also visited a minister’s family who was home-schooled, a growing movement in the United States as well as, much to the journalists’ surprise, in South Korea. A visit to Boys and Girls Town, which also has an affiliation in South Korea, and to the El Museo Latino to hear about illegal Hispanic immigrants in Nebraska, provided the group with a good sense of philanthropic work, social challenges and conservative family values among Americans.”

Each year, the 17-day exchange concludes with a gathering in Honolulu where the Korean and American journalists discuss their observations, assess media coverage of U.S.-Korea issues in both countries, and share ideas on how coverage can be improved.

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