Bank of America Sees Impact of Business Journalism Graduates

By: James Breiner | 05/14/2012

BEIJING -- The Global Business Journalism program at Tsinghua University is helping to generate top-quality coverage of business and finance in the world’s fastest growing economy, said Lisa Xue, chief administrative officer, China, for Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Xue was speaking at a May 13 luncheon hosted by the bank as part of the 10th anniversary of the university's School of Journalism and Communication.

"We’re happy to see GBJ graduates are hired by China’s top media," said Xue. Bank of America Merrill Lynch "is extremely proud of achievements of the program." The bank is one of the founding sponsors, along with the Knight Foundation and Bloomberg, of this master's in business journalism, the only one in China taught completely in English. The International Center for Journalists partnered with Tsinghua to create the business journalism program in 2007.

Shi Anbin, associate dean of International Development at the Journalism School, thanked Bank of America Merrill Lynch and noted that the program would not be possible without such generous support.

Xue also announced that the bank is updating its Glossary of Financial Terms in English and Chinese, which was created as part of the Global Business Journalism program.

Joyce Barnathan, president of the International Center for Journalists, said, "We are hoping to make the glossary interactive in the near future. It provides Chinese translations of financial terms and standardizes the terminology."

The Tsinghua program fits well with the bank's strategy of corporate social responsibility, Xue said: "We believe that education is paramount to creating strong communities and start from the premise that every person should have access to core learning as well as necessary life and social skills to equip them for employment."

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