Romanians Elena Stancu and Vlad Odobescu – BIRN Fellows in 2013

Cristina Blanaru Media, People

2 Romanian journalists, Elena Stancu and Vlad Odobescu, are on BIRN Fellows list for 2013, after the jury of Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence has selected 10 participants for this year’s program.

Vlad Odobescu worked for Romanian Evenimentul zilei from 2006 to 2011, as a special reporter. He was awarded many prizes, including Romanian Press Club’s trophy, European Reporter Award and Superscrieri awards. Vlad writes for Dilema Veche and was reporter and editor at Yahoo News! Romania. Recently, he was reporter-in-residence at New England Center for Investigative Reporting (NECIR) at Boston University (US).

Elena Stancu is Deputy Editor in Chief at Romanian Marie Claire magazine. She published a series of texts in the collective novel Rubik (2008), an experiment of 314, literary group coordinated by Simona Popescu. Elena is associate editor of Punctum, photo magazine, and contributes to more publications, among which Dilema Veche, Men’s Health and Hotnews.ro. Togethe with the Romanian photographer Cosmin Bumbut, she co-authored “Cuba continues” book.

2013 fellows were drawn from more than 100 applicants. The competition for the top places was once again extremely close, and the quality of shortlisted entries was very high.

The journalists were selected through open competition to receive funding and professional support that would help them conduct cross-border research into a topic of regional and EU significance. Participants in the program are selected based on the relevance, feasibility and originality of their proposals, as well as their professional qualifications, motivation and journalistic approach. The theme for this year is integrity.

Program’s fellows in 2013 are Dino Jahic (Bosnia and Herzegovina), Meri Jordanovska (Macedonia), Hana Marku (Kosovo), Marija Milosevic (Serbia), Vlad Odobescu (Romania), Goran Rizaov (Macedonia), Mirko Rudic (Serbia), Erjona Rusi (Albania), Melisa Skender (Croatia) and Elena Stancu (Romania).

The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN, is a group of editors, journalism trainers and reporters, dedicated to creating a strong, professional, independent media in Southeast Europe as an essential component of developing democracy and a market economy in the Balkans.

BIRN is present in nine countries of the Balkan region, with country-based organisations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia and Serbia.

BIRN has editorial and journalistic networks in other countries in the Balkans, namely in Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Montenegro and Romania.