Application Requirements
All Nieman Fellowship applicants must complete an online application form. Candidates must submit the following: two essays; a professional profile and study proposal summary; work samples; and three letters of recommendation.
Questions about the application process may be sent to fellowship program administrator Nicole Arias.
Application deadlines:
- International Nieman Fellowship (non-U.S. citizens, including those working in the U.S.): December 1
- U.S. Nieman Fellowship (U.S. citizens, including those working outside the U.S.): January 31
Candidates who are citizens of both the U.S. and another country should e-mail nieman_applications@harvard.edu for guidance on which category is the most appropriate.
It was when I was at Harvard as a Nieman Fellow that, for the first time, I was really able to find good female role models and also to see how a woman could be a leader.
Chong-ae Lee, NF ’13
Essays
All fellowship candidates must submit two essays: a personal statement and a proposal for study at Harvard. These essays are equally important parts of the application and selection committee members review them carefully. When writing, include examples from your life and work that show you have a significant capacity for growth and leadership. We also want to know how a year at Harvard will help make you a better journalist. Please observe word limits.
Personal statement
The personal statement is an essay of up to 1,000 words that describes your journalistic experience, career plans, and goals. What experiences in life and in journalism have shaped you? What motivates your commitment to journalistic excellence? What are your aspirations for your life ahead in journalism? Why have you chosen this time for a transformative experience away from work? What personal and journalistic values and intellectual interests have influenced your decision to apply?
Proposal for study at Harvard
The study proposal is an essay of up to 500 words that describes how you plan to spend a year at Harvard. What will you study during the fellowship year? What is the driving question or interest that will shape your year? It is not necessary to specify course titles, but please identify the resources at Harvard that will serve your goals in journalism. Note that because a Nieman Fellowship is not a writing residency, book proposals are ineligible.
Candidates applying for a Nieman-Berkman Fellowship for Journalism Innovation should explain how their proposed projects or course of research could have an impact on the broader world of journalism.
It’s a transformative year, completely, first because of the network and the relationships you build here.
Ludovic Blecher, NF ’13
Summaries
All candidates must submit a brief professional profile and a summary of their study proposal.
Professional profile
Provide a short profile (up to 100 words) that summarizes your professional career, including your current position (job title and news organization, if appropriate); publications you have written for and/or other news organizations where you have worked; beats and issues you cover; journalism awards you have won; special interests, etc.
Study proposal summary
Provide a brief summary (up to 50 words) of your proposal for study.
Work Samples
Our specifications for work samples vary depending on the type(s) of work produced, but all samples must be submitted to the online application via non-paywalled URLs or as file uploads.
Candidates who do not publish work as part of their job will submit, in lieu of samples, a statement describing their role and, as appropriate, any supplementary materials.
Work sample specifications
- We are most interested in your recent work. Most of your samples should have been published or broadcast in the 12 months immediately prior to the completion of your application. One older sample may also be submitted.
- Please clearly date all your samples and do not send more than the requested number.
- Samples of published work must be submitted to the online application as individual file uploads or URLs. Any work submitted as a URL must be accessible. If your online work is behind a paywall and requires a subscription, do not submit it as a URL; upload the sample as a file instead.
- You may submit samples from more than one medium, but please do so in rough proportion to the limits indicated below. For example, if half of your samples are print and half are audio, then that means two print samples and up to 15 minutes of audio in total.
- If your samples are not in English, please include a summary of their contents in English. Supporting materials must also be in English.
Instructions by medium or job role
- Print and digital: Submit four samples of published work. Samples must be submitted via non-paywalled URLs or as individual PDF file uploads.
- Photography: Submit five or more published work samples, which together must provide a minimum of 10 images. A sample could be a single image, an article that includes multiple images, or a PDF excerpt from a published book.
- Video and audio: Submit three to five samples of work and, as needed, list timestamp ranges so that the collective viewing or listening time does not exceed 30 minutes. Submit each piece as an individual file upload or via a non-paywalled URL. Include a written synopsis of each sample with a brief description of your involvement in each piece.
- Graphics and data visualization: Submit four samples of published work. Samples must be submitted via non-paywalled URLs or as individual PDF file uploads.
- Editors: Include a statement describing your job. (This is in addition to your two essays.) This statement should be submitted as a PDF file upload to the Portfolio section of the application. You may list up to four non-paywalled URLs or include files of published work along with a description of your role in these samples. For your own published work, follow the instructions for the relevant medium listed above.
- Candidates who work for a news organization in a business, technology, audience engagement, or leadership capacity: Include a statement describing your job and your approach to doing that work. (This is in addition to your two essays.) This statement should be submitted as a PDF file upload to the Portfolio section of the application. If you have supplementary documentation that further illustrates your work, submit that as well.
If you have questions about what types of work samples are acceptable, contact fellowship program administrator Nicole Arias.
Harvard as a whole has been an incredible gift to me. The professors have been outstanding. They’ve been incredibly generous with their time.
David Skok, NF ’12
Letters of Recommendation
Three confidential letters of recommendation are required. These letters should indicate how your abilities and experience make you stand out as a fellowship candidate and should describe your qualifications, your potential for professional growth and leadership, and the impact a fellowship might have on your career in journalism.
Once an applicant completes the references section of the online application for each recommender, SlideRoom will send an auto-generated e-mail to each person with an access link to the online recommendation portal. That e-mail is sent from notifications@slideroom.com with the subject line “The Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard recommendation request from [applicant’s name] for Nieman Fellowships.” Each recommender must type or copy/paste the letter within this portal (no file uploads) by the following dates:
- International Nieman Fellowship applicants: December 15
- U.S. Nieman Fellowship applicants: February 14
Recommendations should be written by:
- Two professional associates familiar with your work who can comment on your journalistic abilities and potential for growth and leadership (for example, current or former colleagues, mentors/advisors).
- An immediate supervisor with an appraisal of your qualifications. (Freelancers: This may be someone who has recently worked with you in a supervisory capacity.)
Use of Artificial Intelligence
Applications must be authored solely by the applicant. Artificial intelligence or machine learning software may not be used to develop or write any part of the application, except as an editing tool to suggest minor edits or to identify grammatical or spelling errors. If you use an AI tool for editing any parts of your submission, you must disclose this in the application.
Apply
We are currently accepting submissions for the 2026-27 Nieman Fellowships.
For questions about the application process, contact Nieman Fellowship program administrator Nicole Arias.