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About the Watchdog Writers Group

The Watchdog Writers Group is a fellowship program and teaching lab based at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. The WWG has a dual mission: to financially support authors as they write a deeply reported nonfiction book in the public interest, while simultaneously training the next generation of young reporters. The WWG’s fellowship provides established journalists an annual stipend of $50,000 for two years, supporting them as they step away from their day jobs to write a book and conduct the type of time-consuming reporting that often falls through the cracks in over-stressed newsrooms.

Where Mentorship Meets Mission

The WWG then partners each fellow with a student at the Missouri School of Journalism who serves as a research and reporting assistant to the fellow. Students conduct a year-long apprenticeship that teaches them the best practices and ethics of investigative reporting. Students can participate in a full-time summer reporting program, during which they produce an investigation under their own byline.

The Group was launched in early 2020 with a three-year, $1.1 million grant from the Schmidt Family Foundation. The WWG is also funded through the generous support of the William T. Kemper Foundation in Kansas City, Mo. Because it is based at the Missouri School of Journalism, the WWG has access to world-class faculty and student reporters, making it a vitally important hub for print journalism and training in the heart of the Midwest.

Watchdog Writers Group funds the type of deep investigative journalism that is under-financed by the private marketplace. We do this by giving annual fellowships to authors, and by hiring students to be reporters alongside them. In doing this, the program hopes to revitalize newsgathering in the middle of the country about vitally important issues

Christopher Leonard, WWG Director