We chatted on finding and filling local information needs: How do you find out what your community needs to know? How do you identify information gaps? And once you’ve found them, how does that knowledge play into what you decide to cover? Join the discussion with Ben DeJarnette of Bridgeliner, Jesse Hardman of The Listening Post, and Mariko Chang of Civil Beat.
Lightning Chats
Membership Programs
How can membership programs help news organizations build and reward loyalty? What can we do to celebrate and build relationships with our most committed users? Join Emily Goligoski of Membership Puzzle Project, Matthew Peterson of The Atlantic, Caroline Kitchener of The Atlantic, and Gracie McKenzie of The Atlantic to discuss it.
Bridging Divides with Online Conversations
A lot of us do most of our engagement work online. Is there room within digital spaces for building empathy and hosting meaningful interactions? Join the discussion with Eve Pearlman of Spaceship Media, Jeremy Hay of Spaceship Media, Halle Stockton of Public Source, and Nancy White of Full Circle.
Bridging Divides Face to Face
We chat with Meredith Turk of Colorado Public Radio, Ross Reynolds of KUOW, and Andrew DeVigal of Agora Journalism Center at the University of Oregon about face-to-face engagement and how it can help bridge divides.
Engagement Tools
We chatted about engagement tools. Poynter’s Ren LaForme hosted.
Hosting Live Events
We had a fruitful conversation on hosting live events with Sarah Binder the Engagement Manager of Iowa Ideas, Megan Finnerty the Director of the USA TODAY Network’s Storytellers Project, and jesikah maria ross the Senior Community Engagement Strategist at Capital Public Radio.
Applying for Engagement Jobs
We chatted with Joy Mayer about what it takes to successfully apply for engagement jobs. What story should you tell about yourself? What format should your portfolio take? What pitfalls should you avoid, especially when talking to hiring editors who don’t specialize in engagement?
Hiring for Engagement
We chatted with Terry Parris Jr. of ProPublica, Summer Fields of Hearken, and Julia Haslanger of Hearken about hiring for engagement. What should you look for in job candidates? What questions should you ask them? How is hiring for these jobs different from other journalism gigs?
Facebook Groups
We chatted with Angilee Shah and Hannah Wise about Facebook groups. How can journalists use Facebook groups to connect with their communities? When’s the right time? How should people be invited? How do conversations get moderated? What are the success metrics?
Teaching Engagement
We chatted about teaching engagement. How is engagement being taught to journalism students, and how SHOULD it be taught? Everyone’s welcome to this conversation with Lori Shontz, Joy Mayer and other educators.
ONA Engagement Highlights
Do you have takeaways to share from the Online News Association conference? Or are you dying to hear what your engagement colleagues learned? Join us for a super quick rundown of some highlights hosted by Joy Mayer.
Engagement at the Texas Tribune
We talked engagement at the Texas Tribune. Alex Samuels, community reporter, talked about how the Texas Tribune works to engage its statewide audience around government, policy and politics.