By Deirdre Stoelzle Graves
In July 2008, Gary Tippet (2004) and Dart Australasia Director Cait McMahon hosted a trauma
and journalism retreat for a large group of Australian and New Zealand journalists at Coolangatta, Queensland.
It was the second such gathering in Australia in the last two years and had two aims: the first was to reach out to Australian and New Zealand journalists who have shown a serious interest in the Dart message and mission and to further inform them on the science and issues around the journalism of
violence and tragedy, as well as to discuss how we can better infiltrate that message into our newsrooms.The second was to further build a cohort of such journalists downunder, given that there has so far only been four Ochberg fellows from the Great Southern Land.
The similar gathering in 2007, at Coff's Harbour in New South Wales, led to the formation of the DOGs (officially, the Dart Opal Group), who initiated the Australian DVD on journalism and trauma and sent an open letter to every news head and executive in the country promoting greater awareness of the issue in their newsrooms.
This year's group has set itself a daunting task: to actively engage the chief news executives of the major organisations in embracing and spreading our message.
*Worth noting the real commitment of these guys: We sat in a narrow, gloomy conference room all day Saturday with the beach a quarter-mile away.
