Bill Celis is a former education correspondent for
The New York Times and a former reporter and columnist in the New York, San Francisco and Dallas bureaus of
The Wall Street Journal.
He is the author of
Battle Rock: The Struggle Over A One-Room School in America’s Vanishing West (Public Affairs, New York, 2002). The book, which chronicles the influx of urban migration to the rural West and the resulting rise of the one-room school, was included on several year-end lists and nominated for the Mountain Plains Regional Book Award. He’s at work on a second book,
Remembering Richard: Immigrants and their Quest for the American Dream, which explores the intersection between the Latino Civil Rights movement and the immigrant rights campaign, around the issue of access to public education. The book, under contract with the State University of New York Press, is scheduled for publication in 2008.
His writings about education have also appeared in the
American Prospect magazine,
The Boston Sunday Globe,
Education Week,
The New York Times Week in Review,
Teacher magazine, and a number of other newspapers and magazines.
Celis, who holds a courtesy appointment in the USC Rossier School of Education, is also a member of several professional organizations, including the Education Writers Association, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists and the Society of Professional Journalists. Celis earned his master’s degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and his undergraduate degree in journalism from Howard Payne College, a small liberal arts college in his native Texas.
At USC Annenberg, he has taught the American Media History seminar, Advanced Magazine Writing, and writing and reporting classes for both undergraduate and graduate students.
closeJOUR 505 - American Media History Seminar (
PDF syllabus)