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Declan Keogh

Headshot of Investigative Journalism Bureau reporter Declan Keogh.
Senior Reporter at the Investigative Journalism Bureau (IJB).

Declan Keogh, ‘19, is a Senior Reporter at the Investigative Journalism Bureau (IJB) (external link) .

How did you arrive at your current position?

I took the investigative class at TMU and liked it. Rob Cribb, who runs the IJB, also teaches that class and I just kind of latched on. Did the class, did the TA and then got an internship at a different organization, but continued to work with Rob and then when the IJB started, I got the job.

What does a typical work day look like for you?

So, a lot of reading, a lot of staring at numbers, spreadsheets, court records and stuff like that. We do long-term projects, a lot goes into them, one published (external link)  took four years, I started working on it while I was a student and it only published this summer. It took years to get the data and report it out. So, it’s a lot of planning and looking forward.

How has your journalism degree and what you learned in school prepared you for your current career?

For me, it was getting into the routine of writing regularly and sticking to deadlines. I freelanced the whole time that I was in school. I think almost every project I did after first year was like a freelance project that I would later publish, so I did two birds with one stone. People as well, just knowing people, now, all my friends from school are doing their own things, and I can reach out to them, and they can reach out to me.

What’s one of your favourite memories from j-school?

In second year, I wrote something for a class and then it ended up on the front page of Now Magazine (external link) , which was a pretty big deal for me, kind of a semi-personal essay looking at HIV criminalization, and the implications and the archaic framework in which we police communicable diseases. So, that was a good memory.

When we went to Hong Kong for the (International Reporting course) in 2018, obviously, there were a lot of memories, I was there with a big group of undergrads and grad students, and we're all still friends. We all did reporting while we were there and worked with journalism students in Hong Kong.

Anything you’d like to add?

If anybody reads this that is still in school, feel free to reach out with questions. We take interns, we have a paid internship, and we also take people for the credit course internship. So if anyone is interested in this kind of work, and long-form research and writing, reach out to me.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Grads at Work is a series of profiles of alums. If you know of a notable grad you’d like to see featured, send us an email at office.journalism@torontomu.ca.