Tips for Smarter Reporting
Fall 2002, Society of Professional Journalists By Jan Schaffer, Executive Director Pew Center for Civic Journalism
The Public Perspective
By Edward M. Fouhy Founder Pew Center For Civic Journalism March, 1996 – As journalists have again proven in this election year, their appetite for poll data — always hearty — has become well nigh insatiable. But many journalists are asking how well conventional survey research serves their readers and viewers and some are seeking a […]
News & Issues in Corporate Social Responsibility
By Edward M. Fouhy Founder Pew Center For Civic Journalism In newsrooms around the country a debate has begun about the basic qualities of good journalism. In a craft not given much to self-examination, the debate over a concept called civic journalism has prompted sharp reaction as journalists have examined their role in society. […]
John Siegenthaler Speech and Response
A Changing Culture in an Unchanging Challenge By John Siegenthaler The Freedom Forum The Lovejoy Convocation — Colby College, November 14, 1996 – To begin, let me state regrettably, that I do not possess a gift of eloquence adequate to express the honor I feel at receiving this award in the name of Elijah Parish Lovejoy […]
Public Journalism: Good or Bad News?
By Jennie Buckner Editor The Charlotte Observer At The Observer, Public Journalism is simply this. When writing about public life, we have a goal: To provide readers the information they need to function as citizens. Saturday, October 19, 1996, Page 19A – Until recently, I had not understood the depth of the American journalism establishment’s devotion to […]
“Keeping in Touch: Civic Journalism–Growing and Evolving”
By Ed Fouhy, Founder and Jan Schaffer, Executive Director Pew Center for Civic Journalism Nieman Reports, The Nieman Foundation At Harvard University, Winter 1995 – In Edgar, Wis., three women who used to hunker down to watch their afternoon TV soap operas now have become C-SPAN junkies, converts to a new cause of civic engagement. In Charlotte, N.C., […]
“The Best or Worst?
By Jan Schaffer Executive Director Pew Center for Civic Journalism Quill, May 1997 – Civic journalism. Why does it drive its critics to such condemnatory hysteria? Even as it leaves readers and viewers with such warmly favorable reactions? That paradox recurs throughout an unprecedented study of four very different civic journalism initiatives supported by the Pew […]
Present Tense, Past Tense: The Historical and Philosophical Roots of Civic Journalism
By Mike Dillon, Ph.D. Department of Communication Duquesne University dillonm@duq.edu Civic Journalism, an organic conception of news that considers community members to be participants in, rather than objects of, public communication, has aroused both admiration and suspicion since emerging from a number of eclectic sources in the early 1990s. It has been promoted by supporters […]
Civic Journalism: 10 Tips for Rebuilding Frameworks of Society
By Jan Schaffer Executive Director Pew Center for Civic Journalism For the American Press Institute, Special Report: Covering a National Tragedy, Managing and Reporting a News Crisis, September 2001 – Amid the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, the news media have served as critical touchstones, helping to unify a nation of individuals in both […]
Lessons in Connecting Readers to the Media
By Jan Schaffer Executive Director Pew Center for Civic Journalism For The American Editor, September 2001 – Does it take terrorist attacks and thousands of casualties to get people reading newspapers again? To displace Chandra and sharks in the headlines? Or are there some other things – perhaps unconventional things – readers are detecting in the […]