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Welcome to the Knight Center’s new low-cost advanced course, “Investigative Reporting Now– OSINT and other cutting edge tools and techniques.”
Throughout four-weeks, students will learn about the latest techniques for gathering information and disseminating it, including Open Source Intelligence, Artificial Intelligence, satellite imagery and various forms of data journalism.
We’ll discuss how each innovation relies on rock solid investigative reporting, a clear hypothesis, detailed reporting and editing plans, open communication (especially in collaborations) and comprehensive fact checking, editing and presentation plans.
This is a course designed for investigative reporters and editors looking to ramp up their skills and experiment with new reporting tools and storytelling techniques. But younger ambitious journalists already dabbling with these techniques are welcome too.
“Investigative Reporting Now” is an asynchronous course, allowing you to log in and complete activities at your own pace throughout the week.
Every Thursday, Lise Olsen will host optional live sessions on Zoom from noon to 1 p.m. (Central time) to discuss the week’s topics. These sessions will be recorded for those who can’t attend.
The course materials are organized into four weekly modules:
Module 1: Planning Complex Investigations
Module 2: Using Data Journalism and OSINT Techniques
Module 3: Cutting-Edge Tools in Investigative Reporting
Module 4: Polishing and Presenting Investigative Stories
Lise Olsen is an investigative reporter, editor and author who has uncovered many twisted tales, including crooked judges, an unjust execution, massive environmental disasters, myriad cases of corruption, and unsolved serial killings.
She’s investigations editor for the Texas Observer magazine and her work has also appeared in the Houston Chronicle, NBC News, Inside Climate News, Texas Monthly and other outlets.
Over the years, her investigative reports have contributed to the prosecutions of a former congressman and a federal judge, inspired laws and reforms, helped solve cold cases, restored names to unidentified murder victims, and freed dozens of wrongfully-held prisoners.
Her first book, Code of Silence: Sexual Misconduct by Federal Judges, the Secret System that Protects Them and the Women who Blew the Whistle, won the 2022 Investigative Reporters & Editors book award and the Texas Institute of Letters’ nonfiction book award. Her new book, The Scientist and the Serial Killer, will be published by Random House in April 2025.
Her reporting has been featured in several documentaries: Paramount+ The Pillowcase Murders (2024); Netflix’s The Texas Killing Fields (2022), about a series of grisly murders spanning several decades; CNN’s The Wrong Man (2015) on the innocence claims of executed offender Ruben Cantu, and the six-part A&E series The Eleven, (2017) about Olsen’s work to reinvestigate a prisoner’s confession to a string of unsolved serial murders in the 1970s.
She has prevously taught MOOCs for the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas and presented at conferences and workshops in a dozen countries. She is a former board member of Investigative Reporters & Editors and currently serves on the board of jurors for the Latin American Congress on Investigative Journalism (COLPIN).
Alejandra Xanic Von Bertrab, is a co-founder and current editor of Quinto Elemento Lab, an investigative nonprofit in Mexico, and a member of ICIJ’s Board since 2018. With over 30 years of experience, she has worked for media like Siglo 21, Público, and Cambio Magazine. She won a Pulitzer Prize in 2013 for her investigation into Walmart’s bribery in Mexico. Since 2017, she has led Quinto Elemento Lab and now co-coordinates its MásterLAB training program for investigative editors.
Marcela Turati, an author, freelance investigative journalist focusing on the Mexican drug war and a founding member of Quinto Elemento. She received the 2013 Louis M. Lyons Award for Conscience and Integrity in Journalism and the 2019 Maria Moors Cabot Prize.
Melissa Del Bosque, author, investigations editor, and co-founder of The Border Chronicle, has reported on the U.S.-Mexico border since 1998 for ProPublica, The Intercept, The Guardian, The Texas Observer, and Harper’s. Her awards include the 2020 RFK Human Rights Journalism Award, the 2016 Hillman Prize, and an Emmy and National Magazine Award in 2015. Her 2012 feature on Juarez Valley massacres was a National Magazine Award finalist and received additional honors from the Association of Alternative News Media and the Pan American Health Organization.
Rocio Gallegos, is a Ciudad Juárez-based journalist focusing on corruption, economy, migration, and the impact of violence and drug trafficking. She co-founded La Verdad and the Juárez Journalists Network. Gallegos was the only woman to direct El Diario de Juárez (2013-2018) and has received the 2011 Knight International Journalism Award, the 2011 Maria Moors Cabot Prize, and the 2012 Zenger Award for Press Freedom. She holds degrees from Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León and the University of Texas at El Paso.
Tristan Lee is a data scientist at Bellingcat whose work focuses on far-right and conspiracy theory networks online.
Steven Monacelli is a freelance investigative journalist based in Dallas, with work featured in Rolling Stone, The Daily Beast, The Real News, Dallas Observer, Dallas Weekly, and more. He is also the publisher of Protean Magazine, a nonprofit literary publication.
Emilia Diaz-Struck, is the executive director of the Global Investigative Journalism Network. Previously, she was a data and research editor at ICIJ, contributing to major projects like Offshore Leaks and the Panama Papers. With over a decade of experience, she has collaborated with journalists in over 110 countries. Díaz-Struck has also worked as an investigative reporting coordinator in Venezuela, taught data journalism at Columbia University, and contributed to major publications like the Washington Post and El Universal.
Deborah Nelson, a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter and editor who currently works for Reuters and for the University of Maryland’s Howard Center for Investigative Journalism.
Josh Hinkle, is the Director of Investigations & Innovation at KXAN, where he leads a duPont and IRE Award-winning team. He also oversees KXAN’s political coverage as the executive producer and host of “State of Texas,” a weekly program and podcast. His work has won three Walter Cronkite Awards and ten Emmys for politics and public affairs.
Keri Blakinger, author, investigative reporter at the Los Angeles Times–and social media influencer. Previously, she reported on criminal justice for the Houston Chronicle and prisons for the Marshall Project. A 2024 Pulitzer Prize finalist, Blakinger’s work includes a feature on Death Row inmates playing “Dungeons & Dragons” and reporting that earned a National Magazine Award. She is also the author of the memoir “Corrections in Ink.”
Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas
300 West Dean Keeton
Room 3.212
Austin, TX, 78712
Phone: 512-471-1391
Email: journalismcourses@austin.utexas.edu