Yale Bulletin and Calendar

October 19, 2007|Volume 36, Number 7

New multimedia online journal will
examine major environmental issues

The Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies (F&ES) is launching an online magazine offering authoritative, cutting-edge opinion, commentary and in-depth reporting on the major environmental issues of the day.

Titled YaleEnvironment Online, the publication will be edited by Roger Cohn, the award-winning former editor of Mother Jones and Audubon magazines.

“The time is right for a global publication that will serve as a forum for provocative writing and thinking on ways to tackle urgent environmental challenges,” said F&ES dean Gus Speth.

Speth noted that the magazine, which will begin publication this spring, is coming online at a moment of “unprecedented” concern about environmental issues, sparked in large measure by growing evidence of the effects of global warming. The journal is designed to appeal to an international audience of policymakers, scientists, journalists, environmental activists and general readers.

According to Cohn, the online magazine will welcome op-ed-type articles from a wide variety of sources and will publish opinion and reported pieces written by some of the world’s leading scientists and researchers, environmental journalists and writers. The site will also offer multimedia content, including video and audio that will feature reports from the field and interviews, as well as panel discussions, blogs by guest writers and interactive graphics. YaleEnvironment Online also will highlight noteworthy articles and documents from outside sources and will provide comprehensive background summaries of pressing environmental topics.

“We believe that there is a need for a dynamic Web publication, international in its reach, that will provide authoritative journalism, sound science and informed opinion and analysis on the environment,” said Cohn. “YaleEnvironment Online will deliver first-rate reporting and commentary and will help make the science of environmental issues understandable and accessible to a worldwide audience.”

While the site is designed to serve as a connection between the academic community and other communities working on environmental issues, it will be written for a general audience.

Launching a global, online environmental magazine is in keeping with two major goals of the University and President Richard C. Levin: making Yale an increasingly international institution and intensifying its focus on environmental issues.

“Yale is working on many fronts to be one of the world’s leading green universities,” Levin said. “With YaleEnvironment Online, it will move to the forefront of reporting on and finding solutions to the most pressing environmental issues of our time.”

Cohn comes to YaleEnvironment Online from a distinguished career in magazine and newspaper journalism, much of it focused on the environment. During his tenure as editor-in-chief at Mother Jones, from 1999 to 2005, he revitalized the magazine, focusing on in-depth investigative reporting and top-quality writing and winning the prestigious National Magazine Award for General Excellence. Under his editorship, Mother Jones’s circulation rose to an all-time high, and the magazine frequently broke stories that received national attention, including an award-winning series on the Bush administration’s environmental record.

Prior to that, Cohn was executive editor of Audubon from 1991 to 1998, helping lead the magazine during a period when it became nationally known for its cutting-edge environmental reporting. He had previously been a staff writer at The Philadelphia Inquirer, where he served as one of the nation’s first environmental reporters.

A graduate of Yale College, Cohn has written for numerous publications, including The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post Magazine and Outside. He has also been a visiting professor at the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley.

YaleEnvironment Online is being funded in part by grants from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.

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