Designer. Coder. Creative.

Michael Grant is a UX design editor at Reveal, from The Center for Investigative Reporting. He aims to carefully apply user-centered design methods to storytelling, strengthen user experiences and develop strategies for creating meaningful engagement with stories. Grant enjoys exploring fresh approaches of engaging new and existing segments of Reveal’s audience through research, and is based in Reveal’s Emeryville, California, office.

A recent John S. Knight Journalism Fellow at Stanford University, he spent 10 months  strengthening his creative problem-solving abilities while working on a journalism challenge. His project explored ways to make digital media training more accessible to journalists of color. Previously, Grant was creative director at the San Francisco Business Times after working  for other legacy media publishers including the Star Tribune in Minneapolis and the San Francisco Chronicle.

Before coming to The Chronicle, Grant worked as a print designer at the Asbury Park Press Design Studio where he was honored with a 2012 Best of Gannett Award for “exceptional design work” on a sports section. Judges said he “brought a small town sports section to life.”

The early days of his career resemble a thesis, having interned at five newspapers including The New York Times Student Journalism Institute, the Orange County Register, the Baltimore Sun, the Sun-Sentinel, and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also selected as a designer for student projects including both NABJ’s and ASNE’s convention student newsrooms.

Working with budding Journalists is also dear to Grant. He leads the Knight/ONA HBCU Digital Media Fellows, a program in it’s sixth year gives a select group of students high-profile exposure and advanced practical knowledge of emerging technologies, tools and approaches to reporting and distributing news online.

He has also served as a NABJ student project mentor in print design and online desks. He mentored the AAJA student project and ONA’s convention student newsroom, and he is cofounder of the NABJ HBCU Task Force. The task force is dedicated to building camaraderie among HBCU stakeholders; providing a range of resources for student media outlets at black colleges; helping black colleges expand/diversify journalism curricula to compete on a national scale; and serving as a watchdog for mainstream media outlets’ coverage of black colleges.