Alaska writer Julia O'Malley has been selected as the Atwood chair of journalism at the University of Alaska Anchorage, the university announced on Wednesday.
O'Malley, a longtime columnist for the Anchorage Daily News who is now an independent Anchorage-based writer and blogger, will engage students in digital journalism and entrepreneurial mass communications, the university said in the announcement. She will teach introductory reporting and writing and a course on Alaska food journalism "that uses cuisine as a gateway into larger stories about the state's changing culture and climate," the university said.
The Atwood chair was established by Robert Atwood, the longtime publisher of the Anchorage Times, with the goal of helping educate future generations of journalists with distinguished visiting professors in the Department of Journalism and Public Communication. O'Malley is the 21st Atwood chair since the program was established in 1979.