About The Project

Reporting on aging for a second year, Columbia's News21 team continues to explore the ways an unprecedent demographic shift will bring change that affects us all.

The 2011 team traveled to eight states, interviewing scores of gerontologists and economists, biostatisticians and business executives, local officials and national experts. Our stories — told through text, photos, interactive graphics, video and audio — portray a nation just beginning to tackle questions of how we live, work and support one other as we age.

Columbia's Brave Old World report is part of the Carnegie-Knight Initiative on the Future of Journalism Education, led by 12 of America's leading universities and supported by two major foundations. Eight schools create News21 incubators, annual national reporting projects overseen by campus professors and distributed nationally through both traditional and innovative media.

Visit projects by our partner schools: Arizona State, Berkeley, Maryland, North Carolina, Northwestern, Southern California and Syracuse