Peter Fray departs The Australian to take professor of journalism role at UTS
Peter Fray, deputy editor of The Australian, is to depart the newspaper for a role as a professor of journalism at UTS.
Fray is a former publisher with the Sydney Morning Herald who after Fairfax created Politifact Australia, which lasted seven months around the 2013 Federal Election. It closed in December 2013 with Fray taking the role at The Australian in March 2014.
“There is a great opportunity to have some space, time and a little bit of money and to think about alternative business models – especially start ups – in journalism,” Fray told Mumbrella.
“I want to have that space to try different things,” he said.
“I learnt a lot from my time at uni and I think students today have a great opportunity but also a lot of pressure.”
Fray will head the UTS journalism school and argued he was keen to teach a form of journalism that was interdisciplinary.
“When I went to uni it was to learn how to write a yarn but now you have to learn a lot of other things and I think UTS is a great place for that. It is extremely innovative from the top down.
“Journalism schools need to be about more than just journalism and learn from the business school, law school and IT.
“All of these people are part of this industry now.”
Fray will start in the full time academic role later this year. He is a member of the faculty’s industry advisory board and has been an adjunct professor in media and politics at Sydney University.
Nic Christensen
He can explain to the kids what a newspaper is.
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Yeah, well…. I think he’s a generation past it. I recall him on stage at MEAA Storyology in Sydney a few years back on a panel with Chris Wirasinha of Pedestrian TV.
He could not contained his stunned amazement that the young Turks were making money from their biz, while he, the media Silverback, had not seen success with his politifacts project.
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Game-changer for UTS journalism school. Congrats Peter.
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Peter has a formidable mind and a generous spirit. I’m long past my uni days, but I can’t help but feel a tinge of jealousy for his future students.
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A loss for The Australian, a win for UTS, congratulations Peter.
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Agreed, Conrad. Formidable and generous indeed. We’d listen to this silverback over 100 chattering monkeys, any day.
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Clever UTS and lucky UTS students. Peter is an energetic and enthusiastic entrepreneurial journalist and a fun yet pragmatic editor. He inspires his people whatever their level but particularly those starting out in their careers. The Canberra Times was a happy, buzzing, forward-thinking place while he was editor there.
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