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LA Unified journalism high school gets $15,000 donation

A Los Angeles Unified School District bus.
A Los Angeles Unified School District bus.
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A donation announced Tuesday to a 3-year-old journalism high school in the San Fernando Valley will help the struggling program to upgrade reporter training.

The producer of “Addiction Incorporated,” a documentary on big tobacco companies, is donating $15,000 to Daniel Pearl Magnet High School in Van Nuys.

It’ll go to create a much-needed broadcast news class, says 11th-grader Ellie Batchiyska, editor of the campus newspaper.

"Our journalism program has been underfunded for a while now," Batchiyska said, "and journalism is the main component of our school, so I think it should be one of our top priorities, and when I heard this I couldn’t help but imagine all opportunities we’d get."

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The 340-student high school was named after San Fernando Valley native Daniel Pearl, a Wall Street Journal reporter killed nine years ago while researching terrorism in Pakistan.

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