10/25/96

ATHENS, Ohio -- A fixture at the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism -- Professor Dru Riley Evarts -- has moved to Washington for fall and winter quarters to study the U.S. Supreme Court and the press corps that covers it.

On a faculty fellowship leave until she returns to teaching spring quarter, Evarts will interview reporters covering the Supreme Court to determine their ethnicity, gender, religion and politics. Evarts also will study how the media use oral arguments at the Supreme Court.

Studying a reporter's background and its influence on coverage of the court is particularly important because the Supreme Court Justices rarely talk to the media about their views, according to Evarts.

"The Supreme Court is the only branch of government where the justices themselves don't express their views except once in a while at commencement addresses," Evarts said.

Evarts also will work as a visiting editor at the Scripps Howard News Service in Washington.

Evarts completed a bachelor's degree from Ohio University in 1951, spent 20 years working as a journalist, then returned to complete a master's degree and doctorate in journalism. She was the first woman among the OU journalism faculty to receive tenure and, in 1986, to be promoted to full professor.