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“Journalism that Matters: Looking Beyond the Newsroom Walls”
A two-day action seminar for news professionals
Fri./Sat. June 30-July 1, University of Massachusetts Amherst Campus Center
The next newsroom will operate differently from those of today. Of course there will still be the professional journalist. There also will likely be unpaid community journalists, activists and citizens who are helping shape and deliver the news. The newsroom walls will extend to kiosks, coffee shops and cell phones on your belt. What will the news look like, how will it be distributed, and who will pay for it? Join a two-day seminar in which you will pose answers and begin to lead these changes rather than be swept up by them.
On Friday, June 30 and Saturday, July 1, at UMass Amherst, the Media Giraffe Project is hosting a convening of “Journalism that Matters” seminar facilitated by Stephen Silha, of the Journalism that Matters project and Chris Peck, one of the nation’s most widely respected daily newspaper editors. Designed for those who want to roll up their sleeves and create experiments in journalism and community storytelling, “Journalism that Matters” explores new economic models, journalism as a conversation, teaching and learning, as well as change leadership in the newsroom and the community.
Three times during the last year, small groups of journalists and other citizens met in Michigan and Missouri. The seminars were part of the “Journalism that Matters” initiative, supported by the Fetzer Institute, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Blandin Foundation.
Participants took a step back from daily routine, asked and answered a series of questions. The answers led to a several specific insights and initiatives, large and small. A few are underway. More important, the sessions provided journalists with a chance to share concerns, dreams and actions . . . to begin thinking above the crowd -- like “giraffes.” Together they agreed the essential purpose of journalism is to give people the information they need to make informed decisions about their lives. One insight was to view the future of journalism as no longer encapsulated in newsrooms, but rather as part of a broad news ecosystem -- an ecology that involves citizens, government, institutions and journalists, each of whom plays multiple roles newly enriched – and complicated -- by the interactive, many-to-many technology of the Internet.
At Amherst, we’ll take that insight a step further:
1. “What are the implications of technology and the changing news ecology on the way news is gathered and delivered?”
2. “What are new ways to practice journalism that make it cool for citizens to be participants in democracy? “
3. “Working collaboratively and practically, what can we pledge to do today?”
Participants will:
· Conceive experiments in “journalism that matters” you can apply at home
· Expand the informal network of people creating the new news ecology
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