City University London´s Graduate School of Journalism has appointed former BBC Economics Correspondent Steve Schifferes as its first Marjorie Deane Professor of Financial Journalism. Steve will lead the new Financial Journalism MA from September 2010, and will teach a module on the Erasmus Mundus Global Journalism MA from September 2009.

Professor Schifferes held a number of positions at the BBC including Acting Editor of its online business pages, Issues Producer for its online coverage of the last general election and TV Producer for both “On the Record” and “The Money Programme”. His final assignment at the BBC was to co-ordinate its online anniversary coverage of the financial crisis one year on.

City´s Head of Journalism, former International Editor of The Times, George Brock said: “Thanks to the generous gift from the Marjorie Deane Foundation, we have been able to attract a financial journalist of Steve´s calibre and experience to help further strengthen what the Graduate School of Journalism offers. This reinforces the School´s position as Europe´s leading provider of journalism education.”

John Micklethwait, Editor-in-Chief of The Economist and chairman of the trustees of the Marjorie Deane Financial Journalism Foundation, said: “All the trustees are delighted that somebody of Steve Schifferes´s quality will be the first Marjorie Deane Professor of Financial Journalism. Marjorie was a wonderfully generous person, who set up her foundation to help improve writing about finance and economics. This appointment is a big step forward in that respect, and also a sign of the trust´s ambitions.”