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NEWSPAPERS | BROADCAST | DIGITAL
NEWSPAPERS | BROADCAST | DIGITAL
You may have noticed the #AAJAFamily hashtag trending on social media this summer. That's how members of the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) describe the organization and its annual conference to E&P, “like a family.” E&P reached out to AAJA officers and members to hear about their experiences at AAJA23 and what this organization has meant to them professionally and personally.
A year into his role as NPR's audience editor, Latino audiences, Pablo Valdivia reflects about his job and what he’s discovered about NPR’s Latino listeners. He notes that he consults with the newsroom, introducing them to stories of interest to Latino listeners and steering them away from stories that speak about Latinos without hearing from Latinos.
Experience, skills and a track record for excellence are essential characteristics of successful people in any profession, including journalism. Newspapers of all sizes have contracted, and thousands of journalism jobs have disappeared. While many veteran journalists are accepting buyouts or retiring, an even newer trend is more of them still want to contribute to the profession in some capacity.
A newsroom is not going to workshop its way to inclusivity. Spending $20,000 on 24 hours’ worth of training spread out over three days will just leave your organization $20,000 lighter. Instead, developing, implementing and communicating a clear DEI strategy will broaden the perspectives in the newsroom and likely improve retention.
The HBCU Student Reporting Network, which launched in January, is designed to give Black student journalists more training and opportunities to take into the workforce. Each student works with a mentor to help sharpen their reporting skills, and the organization works with distribution partners to increase the reach of their stories and enable fellows to graduate with clips and a network.
Collaboration among news media outlets is not new, but The Exchange is a new collaborative effort that aims to create business and financial content for underserved communities. It’s a collaboration of local, diverse news media with decades of service to their communities, the Local Media Association (LMA), the Local Media Consortium (LMC) and Deloitte.
The “gender beat” concept developed less than a decade ago, but it has already evolved significantly since then. While many of the journalists interviewed by Meg Heckman, a journalist, author and educator with Northeastern University, thought the concept of a gender beat should not be necessary, she believes it is a necessary stepping stone in the short term.
Dave Stevens is the only legless player in sports history to have played NCAA football and minor league baseball. The seven-time Emmy-winning sports journalist is now a motivational speaker and television host as he nears 40 years in broadcasting. While he says the media industry has come a long way in terms of inclusivity, he adds: "we still have a long way to go in this and other aspects of society."
Distrust between Pittsburgh's diverse communities and the media is a significant problem identified in an American Press Institute pilot program, which implemented an Inclusion Index developed by Letrell Deshan Crittenden, Ph.D. A Jan. 24 event at the August Wilson African American Cultural Center in Pittsburgh drew media and community members who spoke about improving coverage.
