The Urban Journalism Workshop (UJW) is an annual program that teaches D.C. area high school students the fundamentals of journalism through interactive lectures, hands-on training, and field trips.

Professional journalists, educators, and senior journalism college students provide mentorship and supervision to program participants, who meet for at least eight consecutive Saturdays each spring. 

UJW aims to identify and rectify the under-representation of Black people and other minority groups in newsrooms across the country by building a diverse pipeline of future journalists and media leaders that’s critical for equitable representation in news coverage and decision-making. 

The late George E. Curry, a journalist and a longtime champion of the Black press who died in August 2016 at the age of 69, started the UJW program in 1986 after he moved from St. Louis to the nation’s capital to become the editor of the now defunct Emerge magazine.

Since then, the Washington Association of Black Journalists has been sustaining the program and Curry’s legacy. In June 2021, the WABJ Executive Board established in Curry’s honor an academic scholarship to support to a graduating high school senior who has completed all program requirements and will enroll in an accredited college or university. 

UJW is WABJ’s premier community service initiative, and it runs every Saturday from early March to early May at American University, a longtime supporter of the program. Some UJW alumni now work or have previously worked for companies including The Los Angeles Times, The Associated Press, NBC Owned Television Stations, ESPN, Sirius/XM, Spectrum News, and local TV network affiliates across the country.