Times launches bursary scheme in honour of former foreign editor Richard Beeston

The Times has launched a new bursary scheme in honour of its former foreign editor, Richard Beeston, who died a year ago aged 50.

The newspaper is offering two £6,000 awards under the bursary, one for an aspiring foreign correspondent, and another for a journalist with experience of working in Lebanon, the occupied West Bank or Israel.

In addition to the money, the aspiring foreign correspondent will spend six weeks abroad, researching and reporting for the paper. The other winner, meanwhile, will undertake a six-week fellowship on The Times’s foreign desk in London.

The Times said: “The bursary being set up in his name is designed to address Richard’s passionate belief that good journalists are not forged in the classroom or the newsroom, but in the field.

“He loved to mentor aspiring young foreign correspondents and to give them the opportunity to develop their reporting and writing skills by working on a fast-breaking news story.

“He cared deeply about the Middle East, and the fact that the Iraqi and Israeli ambassadors sat side by side at his memorial service is testament to the even-handed nature of his reporting.”

The deadline for applications is at 9am on 29 September, and the candidate must be available to undertake the travel or fellowship between November and September next year.

The Times has more details about the bursary here.