The IRE office will be closed from December 25th to January 5th.
IRE on Campus Training
The Rick Gevers-Karen Burns Diversity Endowed Fund for College Journalists was established to support training at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Hispanic-Serving Institutions, Minority-Serving Institutions and other campuses serving student journalists of color.
In September 2024, IRE partnered with the Ida B. Wells Society for Investigative Reporting to conduct the Gevers-Burns Fund's first regional event, the HBCU Investigative Journalism Workshop at the Atlanta University Center Library. Student journalists of color came from throughout Georgia and other states.
In March 2025, IRE partnered with the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio and other local sponsors for the second Gevers-Burns event, the HSI Workshop for Investigative and Data Journalism. It was attended by student journalists of color from numerous Texas universities and other states.
The next event to be underwritten by the Gevers-Burns Fund will be Feb 12-13, 2026: the Indigenous Student Investigative Journalism Workshop will be held at the Oklahoma Center for Nonprofits in Oklahoma City. It will provide training for Indigenous students and students of all backgrounds attending Tribal Colleges and Universities, Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-Serving Institutions, Alaska Native- and Native Hawaiian-Serving Institutions and Native American-Serving Nontribal Institutions nationwide. The MacArthur Foundation is providing support toward scholarships.
The Indigenous Student workshop is exclusively for students who receive a scholarship to attend. The scholarship includes a travel stipend for those living outside of Oklahoma City and a travel and lodging stipend for those living out of state. To apply, fill out this form.
What IRE Offers
By participating in the Gevers-Burn program, student journalists receive:
- Training in techniques for conducting investigative interviews, accessing public information and leveraging the power of data and AI.
- Hands-on training in either Google Sheets and data analysis or AI and ChatGPT.
- A networking session with career professionals
- A one-year IRE membership or membership renewal
IRE on Campus
In 2022 and 2023, the Lumina Foundation sponsored the IRE on Campus program, which provided free, customized training to educators and students at higher education institutions that served historically marginalized people.
As a student member of IRE you get the same member benefits as professionals! Here are a few additional resources to be aware of:
- Keep your student membership rate after graduation: If you join IRE as a student and keep you membership current until graduation, you'll get to keep the student membership rate ($25/year) for up to three years after graduation. That's a savings of $45 a year!
- Student pricing for IRE training: We offer lower prices for students attending our trainings. As long as you have a student membership, you'll get the student event rate. That makes training more affordable during and immediately after college.
- Conference Mentorship Program: Attending one of our annual conferences (NICAR or IRE)? Watch for our free conference mentorship program announcement. Sign up to be matched with a mentor, and IRE will pair you with a journalist who can offer guidance on a project, your career and more.
- Listservs: One of the best ways to get help and build your professional network is by joining an IRE email listserv. The NICAR-L listserv is geared toward data journalism. Get help with data problems you're facing, or just follow the conversations to learn more about data journalism.
- Enter your work in the IRE Awards: Students enter our annual contest for free! Submit your best investigative or data-driven work for a chance to win prestigious recognition. All stories enter into the contest go into IRE's library of Contest Entries, allowing your work to inspire others for years to come.
Meet Your IRE Expert
Francisco Vara-Orta
Francisco Vara-Orta brings 17 years of newsroom experience to his role as IRE's first director of diversity and inclusion. Vara-Orta joined the IRE staff in February 2019 as a training director. While working as a trainer, he has conducted sessions on managing data and investigative reporting for journalists across the United States and internationally. He has worked for a variety of online and print publications, including Chalkbeat, Education Week, the San Antonio Express-News, Austin Business Journal, Los Angeles Business Journal and the Los Angeles Times. He earned a master’s degree in investigative/data journalism at the University of Missouri and a bachelor’s degree from St. Mary’s University in San Antonio.