Documented Weekly includes a summary of the most important immigration news of the week in their weekly, Spanish newsletter. Subscribers are able to contact Documented reporters to ask questions and make suggestions about what news is of greatest interest to Spanish-speaking New Yorkers. They’ve recently done Q&As regarding health care access, tenants’ rights, immigration procedures, labor rights, and fake news (with Univision). More from API.
Drawn from a report by the Institute for Nonprofit News and Dot Connector Studio. NJ Spotlight On Cities is an annual conference that brings together people who believe in vibrant urban centers. In 2016, NJ Spotlight also incorporated crowd-sourcing into planning the event schedule, and questions and issues brought up during an open session of the event informed a Q & A with gubernatorial hopefuls later that day. More than 250 people participated. More here and here.
Off the Bus was a citizen journalism reporting project covering the 2008 and 2012 elections (a collaboration between the Huffington Post and NewAssignment at New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute). The project connected over 12,000 citizen journalists with Huffington Post staffers to cover the election in ways traditional media couldn’t. Professional journalists acted as guides, and citizen journalists were given the tools to publish content they created.
For over ten years, Kentucky-based Mountain Community Radio (WMMT) has been producing the weekly radio program Calls from Home, which sends messages and call-outs to prison inmates in Central Appalachia. WMMT records the messages (often from friends and family members), and then broadcasts them on air for prisoners listening in. Calls from Home has been featured by WNYC, West Virginia Public Broadcasting, The American Prospect, Here & Now, and others.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) launched the G20 Street Level project to cover the 2010 G20 Summit in Toronto. The CBC invited its audience to document and report on the summit itself and surrounding events. Communities could report on what they found important and the CBC had quicker response times and wider coverage. Contributors were trained in basic reporting skills and supported throughout the process. Learn more about this project from CBC’s reflections and MediaShift.
In preparation for a county commissioners meeting on Miami’s transit issues, The New Tropic asked its readers to share solution ideas using the Twitter hashtag #solveMIAtransit. The New Tropic then curated those tweets in a Storify gallery on its site, allowing visitors to see what other people were saying and to join the conversation on Twitter. It also hosted a happy-hour event to discuss transit issues, published opinion pieces by community members, and used the #solveMIAtransit hashtag to point readers to related conversations and additional information.
In 2017, the Honolulu Civil Beat launched “Office Hours” on Facebook Live, where journalists held real-time conversations on local and international news with livestream participants. These sessions drew 2,000-4,000 views on average, with some drawing as many as 24,000 views. Civil Beat’s best sessions happened when they left their office and responded to questions and comments from their viewers. Watch past sessions or read more.
Drawn from a report by the Institute for Nonprofit News and Dot Connector Studio. Framed by WDET is an audio-visual series that pairs storytelling and photography together to tell the stories of ethnic and cultural communities throughout the Detroit metro area. WDET forms teams consisting of local photographers and award-winning storytellers to document these stories, and then shares the results in a series of audio-visual installations that migrate throughout southeast Michigan.
Bitch Media tested whether engagement platform Hearken improved engagement and/or increased membership among users. During the “Turning Readers Into Funders” experiment, Bitch Media found that Hearken-prompted content was 125% more engaging than non-Hearken prompted content. Learn more from Hearken’s project review and their ONA17 session.
Drawn from a report by the Institute for Nonprofit News and Dot Connector Studio. Along with Albuquerque’s NPR and PBS stations, New Mexico In Depth is part of People, Power & Democracy, which was an annual multimedia collaboration covering New Mexico’s state government that held annual public community engagement events. The 2017 event attracted a diverse group of approximately 40 people who discussed current government problems, ways to improve them, and suggestions for future reporting. The event was also live-streamed. More here, here, and here.
Drawn from a report by the Institute for Nonprofit News and Dot Connector Studio. Listening Post Macon facilitated a weekly conversation on local issues through text messages that delivered a mix of news and questions designed to engage residents. Multiple stories came directly from community tips, including a story about a mother teaching her children to use guns because her child was shot and killed walking to the gas station. Learn more.
Drawn from a report by the Institute for Nonprofit News and Dot Connector Studio. During the 2016 election cycle, VTDigger hosted a candidate roster that featured contact information, issues platforms, and campaign finance data for both the primary and general election races. This information was supplied by candidates (in response to a survey from VTDigger) and campaign finance reports filed with the Vermont Secretary of State. Check out their 2016 project announcement, Candidate Comparison tool, Legislative Candidate Guide, and Statewide Candidate Guide.
