sessions

event_description ✖

• During each long break, we're going to have space for a short meditation or movement session and a couple "birds of a feather" small-group conversations on particular topics. If you'd like to lead one of these short sessions, email [erika@opennews.org](mailto:erika@opennews.org). 2
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• What I'm doing: leading a writing workshop based on the Amherst method, which was specifically developed as liberatory practice for silenced and marginalized voices, and is of course, welcoming to all. I once ran workshops for the New York Writers Coalition, which provides a quiet space for New Yorkers to write and share for 1-2 hours a week. Workshops are open to all at public libraries or are held at Rikers, nursing homes, community centers, alternative high schools, parks, etc. What you'll get: In response to specific writing prompts, me-time to write and if you so desire, share it with us for affirmative feedback. I will provide instructions. We'll likely do two writing rounds. Who's welcome: you, your kids, your spouse, etc. What you will need: a notepad, pen/pencil, a willingness to trust your voice, and encourage each other. (Remember, you're under no obligation to share what you write) Optional: preferred beverage, other treats, etc. 1
• Back in March, a bunch of us saw that our newsrooms and institutions were failing to prepare to protect journalists as the pandemic spread. So we got together and made a guide to help people push their newsrooms to create policies that protected their staff. Four months later, coronavirus is spreading even faster, disinformation is convincing a large minority that it is all a big hoax, and layoffs have thrown many people—including many from our own newsrooms—deeper into precarity. It feels like there is no reprieve in sight. But we aren’t powerless either: with projects like the Newsroom Guide to COVID-19, the COVID Tracking Project, FindTheMasks.com and neighborhood mutual aid projects, we are building ways to support each other with information and physical resources. None of this is enough but with 8 to 14 months to go in the most optimistic estimates, we gotta do something. So let’s take some time to imagine and plan for what’s next. 1
• Because of COVID, I’ve been cooking at home a lot more and thinking about how other busy people are finally figuring out ways to make the most of their time in the kitchen (especially those of us who used to rely on restaurants and bars). There's many things we could discuss on this topic, so join the #food-and-drink channel in the conference Slack to help create the agenda for our discussion! 1
• Destinée-Charisse Royal on how to have difficult but effective conversations with people about racism, sexism, you name it. 1
• Early on in Vox Media’s 10-year history, the media company proudly acknowledged that building a diverse, equitable, and inclusive company was a business-critical task. Though strides have been made in that decade, there remains a lifetime of work left to do. Today, as all companies must support employees amid a global pandemic and racial justice uprising, Vox Media’s Chris Clermont and Vox’s Christina Animashaun encourage individuals in every role, at every company, to add a new requirement to their job descriptions: foster an inclusive culture. Chris Clermont (He/Him) is the D&I Program Manager at Vox Media, and is pioneering project work focused on building empathy, leading with authenticity, and managing bias at Vox Media – building a roadmap for accelerating and sustaining diversity, equity and inclusion at the company and in media. Christina Animashaun (They/them) is the News Graphics Designer for Vox. Their job at Vox is to show – not just tell – the stories of the day by producing and editing news graphics, data visualization, photography and illustration. Prior to Vox, they worked as a graphics reporter at POLITICO and as a researcher at the Investigative Reporting Workshop. In this conversation, Clermont and Animashaun share lessons from their professional and personal experiences, and invite others to share successes and failures on the road to pursuing an equitable company culture. Join a conversation that includes: * Breaking the myth that diversity is a person — inclusive hiring along isn’t the answer. * Action-based recommendations for putting a company’s values into practice. * Pitfalls that the most inclusive and innovative companies run into. * Immersive storytelling * Foundational tips on how to launch one’s own racial equity initiative or take a current diversity, equity and inclusion initiative to the next level. 1
• Editorial collaborations are trending across the news industry with more and more organizations co-reporting and co-publishing stories and projects. But far less common are partnerships on development, design and production needs, an area where most newsrooms may not be fully equipped and could use more support, as most outlets don’t have their own dedicated developer, designer, and other technologists on staff. Yet this 'invisible work' is often the foundation of strong, innovative journalism. This Spring, a developer and an editor from The Chicago Reporter, a small investigative news organization of just five staffers, teamed up with a designer/producer at WBEZ, Chicago’s NPR station with a newsroom of more than 70 people, to cover the coronavirus pandemic in a unique way. Our goal was to avoid duplicating efforts on the hard but critical work of efficiently processing and visualizing important local data and reporting on the crisis of our lifetimes, and instead play to each other’s strengths to build stronger news products. And by sharing the assets this partnership produced with a dozen other local newsrooms in two languages, our tools and graphics attracted more than 1.2 million sessions in less than three months. In this session, we’ll share everything we learned about building a symbiotic collaboration between very different newsrooms, including tips and strategies for getting buy-in from your bosses, establishing streamlined workflows, creating assets that work for a variety of different organizations (and their CMS’s), and feedback loops to improve your products between different audience’s needs. We’ll also share our experiences of other successful — and not so successful — attempts to partner to meet journalistic needs beyond the writing and reporting. Most importantly, we want to hear about the ‘invisible work’ you've collaborated on, the work you wish you could collaborate on, and help you develop strategies and technical solutions for getting there. 1
• Moiz Syed and Ellis Simani on objectivity, privilege, and how both bleed into how journalism interacts with protests. 1
• Newsrooms are work horses. They pump stories out of a churning workflow that is routinized and habitual. And like any habit, that workflow is hard to change. Involving and serving community members who aren’t already part of our audience takes new habits. In this session, we’ll find what those new habits might look like for you and your organization. In this workshop we’ll - Discuss what makes participation meaningful - Use your experiences to explore the principles of participatory journalism - Help you identify current and new practices that bring more communities into journalism production You’ll leave with a worksheet full of participatory journalism practices co-created by the group to experiment with back in your newsroom. 1
• Our Projects, Products, & Research track is here to connect you with tools and ideas to plug into your work _right now_. We’ve invited the folks behind some amazing journalism projects to [introduce themselves in advance](https://2020.srccon.org/projects-products-research/): * The Accountability Project (#proj-accountability-project in the Slack) * Big Local News (#proj-biglocal in the Slack) * Datasette (#proj-datasette in the Slack) * Election SOS (#proj-election in the Slack) * Memberkit (#proj-memberkit in the Slack) * Product Kit from News Catalyst (#proj-product-kit in the Slack) * The Quilt: Policy, Art, and Healing (#proj-the-quilt in the Slack) * Systems Thinking for Journalists from Journalism + Design (#proj-systems-thinking-toolkit in the Slack) This track is async-friendly, designed to help you learn more about these projects then connect with them for 1-1 questions or group conversations. * [Check out the Projects, Products, & Research page for intro videos and demos](https://2020.srccon.org/projects-products-research/) * Each project has a channel in the SRCCON Slack. Find them there! They're excited to share more! * SRCCON is all about making space for emergent conversations. Many of those will happen in Slack, or jump from there onto different platforms. If a project schedules an "office hours" style meetup during this time on the schedule, we'll also highlight it here. 1
• Some are born managers, some achieve management, and some have management thrust upon them. But how many of us are truly prepared for the experience - intellectually and emotionally? In this session we will work together to build a toolkit for new (formal and informal) managers to approach their job with empathy and ethics. What we wish we knew, what nobody tells you, what you should really listen to, and what to discard. We welcome your hacks, your best and worst experiences, your successes and failures, to equip the next generation of managers. (Non-managers welcome!) 1
• The Newsroom Diversity Survey was created with the intention of pushing the industry to reach parity with the United States' demographics by 2000, a goal it's had to postpone—twice. That leaves an unasked question: Should parity still *be* the goal? Although the diversity survey has become an institution in the industry, the effort itself is still limited in both scope and service. As journalism undergoes a process of creative destruction where outlet types, job titles/functions, audiences and *the communities* that we serve are evolving with chaotic velocity, how can organizations like NLA assist outlets incorporate tracking and reporting their internal demographics and use that information to inform hiring, retention and promotion efforts, as well as doing more culturally competent reporting? How might NLA help individuals and groups "apply pressure everywhere" to make tangible progress in truly integrating journalism? 1
• What better way to start our last day at SRCCON than with some low-pressure drawing, sketching or painting? We’ll have some planned group activities (workshopped in #bof-drawing), or you can just sketch your heart’s desire while chatting with some like-minded folks. Absolutely no skill or prior experience needed. 1
• Where do you find inspiration outside of your speciality, especially in areas that resonate at a personal — not professional — level? It might sound self-indulgent to wander beyond what seems most immediately useful, especially amid so much turmoil and suffering today. But to fully recognize each other’s humanity, we must also discover our own. Art, music, poetry and other forms of expression can help us see and feel beyond our personal experiences. As we strive to be better people, let’s share and discuss works that have transformed our understanding or sparked our passion beyond the practical. 1
• With police always in the news, let’s talk about how to best investigate them and what newsrooms generally get wrong in reporting on police (believing everything they say, for one). 1