Final Report: California Endowment Planning Grant
NPR Local News Initiative - August 21, 2007
Strategic Goals
This report outlines actions to build the capacity of California public radio stations to produce news and public affairs coverage at a consistently high level of quality.
In addition to strengthening the service these stations provide their communities, these recommendations are also intended to encourage more robust participation by all California stations in the production of news coverage for public radio listeners around the state and the nation.
These recommendations are predicated on a desire for closer collaboration and partnership between California stations, NPR, and journalism programs at both public and private California universities.
The actions proposed in this report were informed by a survey of California stations conducted by the LNI and NPR Audience Research. Two planning meetings were convened to review survey findings, discuss potential actions and develop recommendations. Attendees included NPR staff, California stations and representatives from University of California at Berkeley, the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School of Communications and Mills College. The Managing Editor of the Northwest News Network was also invited to share her experience and expertise working with public radio’s most well-established regional Hub. (N3 is governed and supported by stations in Washington, Oregon and Idaho, and is a model for how large urban stations and smaller rural stations can benefit by crafting equitable cost-sharing arrangements to finance regional spot news and feature reporting.)
Background:California: One State/Two Distinct Tiers of Station Capacity
California stations all exist within the boundaries of a single state, but operate day to day in two very different universes. A handful of stations – largely in California’s most populous cities – enjoy a high level of human and financial resources. The majority of California stations – largely but not exclusively in smaller California communities - operate with far less. This dramatic contrast was documented in a survey of California stations conducted by NPR.
- Nearly half (40%) of California NPR member stations do not have a News Director.
- Nearly half (40%) of California NPR member stations do not have a full-time news reporter.
- More than half (55%) of university licensee NPR member stations in California do not have students working in the news department. This data also revealed California’s “low resource” stations lag well behind NPR member stations around the country in the money and people needed to do the job.
Our recommendations focus on two key strategies to strengthen the “low resource” station group and eliminate the “two tier” world of California stations;
- The establishment of a Public Radio Fellowship Program
- The piloting of a California Regional Editor System to provide editorial support, training and increased station-to-station communication and coordination.
Both activities will be administered by NPR and the Local News Initiative.
Recommendation 1:
Public Radio Fellowship Program
This new fellowship program will be established via a partnership between public radio and journalism programs at the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Southern California Annenberg School and Mills College. The NPR Local News Initiative worked with representatives from these schools to draft a description and application form for the program which will place graduates in first jobs at targeted/lower resource California public radio stations. Host stations for the Fellows will be selected via a competitive station RFP process.
Station RFP Process:
Public Radio Fellowship Program
Target Stations include NPR member stations KCHO/Chico, KHSU/Arcata, KZYX/Philo, KRCB/Rohnert Park, KAZU/Monterey, KUSP/Santa Cruz, KVPR/Fresno, KCBX/San Luis Obispo, KCLU/Thousand Oaks and KVCR/San Bernadino.
Should an NPR affiliate choose for any reason not to participate, and should a second (non-NPR station) also serve that community, we recommend that the secondary station then be approached to take part in the project.
Proposals will be solicited from the target stations. Assistance will be offered to stations that are interested in responding to the RFP but want more help developing their proposal. The station proposal will include:
- List of current station staff (paid and volunteer) and current news programming
- Information about station pay scales/local cost-of-living data
- Description of station news service and programming goals
- Description of the role the Fellow will play in meeting those goals
- Detailed job description and work scope for Fellow position. Priority will be given to those stations where the Fellow will devote the bulk of his/her time to news reporting and production versus announcer-on-duty and other tasks that full more under the heading of “operations” than news.
- Sample budget including all expenses related to the support of the Fellow and his/her work including (but not limited to) salary, benefits, equipment and facilities, mileage, etc.
- Demonstration of knowledge/understanding of public radio core values
- Assurance of willingness to let the Fellow work “larger than station” via the regional editor/s and participation in issue- oriented news collaborations that connect the station’s service area/community with others around the state.
- Assurance of sustainability – the station be required to propose a funding formula and timeframe based on station development capacity that will demonstrate its ability to fully support the position filled by the Fellow. For example, the fellowship will be 90% subsidized in the first year, 60% in year two, 30% in year three and fully funded by the station after that.
Prior to the awarding of a fellowship, the selected host station will be visited by a representative from the Fellow’s journalism program and the NPR’s Local News Initiative to get an “on the ground” view of current program resources and service, and further discuss and shape the development of sustainability strategies.
NOTE: The need to make these positions sustainable by stations is critical. Otherwise we will be creating a program that will not survive over the long term. This goal dictates that the Fellowship/s must be of sufficient duration to allow stations to build funding for the position. It was agreed that 3 years seemed about right. The same person need not hold the Fellowship for the entire period although anyone named as a Fellow will be asked for a guaranteed commitment of one year with preference given to those who will provide a longer term commitment.
Evaluation of all proposals will be done by a panel to include representatives from California stations, the participating journalism schools and NPR. The process used by the panel will model that used successfully by the LNI’s national Hubs effort which selected projects chosen from almost three dozen submitted by public radio stations around the country.
Recommendation 2:
California Regional Editor (Pilot Project)
The establishment of regional editor/s will provide editorial support to stations that currently lack the capacity to consistently edit the news content they produce. This basic and critical need emerged as the highest priority in the NPR/LNI survey of California stations - drawing double the response of any other action option. The editor/s will:
- Provide training in news production, focusing on those skills most requested by stations including story selection and framing, writing and interviewing.
- Provide mentoring support for and – at station request – critiques of station news staff including Fellows.
- Work to enhance the ability of the target stations to collaborate around shared issues, particularly those they have identified as priorities; politics, education, the environment and health care.
- Communicate about and coordinate his/her efforts with the NPR bureau chiefs, The California Report and any other programming produced for statewide broadcast in California.
This position should be in place well before the first Public Radio Fellow is selected so that advance station outreach and needs assessment can be completed.
The Role of California’s High Resource Stations
While the primary focus of these recommendations is on the “lower resource” stations in California, the higher resource stations in Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco and Sacramento can each play a critical role by serving as mentors and by – as some have already offered – hosting residencies that will allow Fellows and other small station news staff to observe program production techniques and protocols at stations with larger staffs and budgets.
This relationship will have the added benefit of creating a “career ladder” to identify, groom and promote news talent ready for the next step in their professional development. This system will also pay off by helping the California public radio system retain talent in whom the Hub has invested. The journalism schools that worked with us on this project believe creating a pathway from “first jobs” in California’s smaller markets to larger market stations will also make fellowship participation highly attractive to their students.
More experienced staff at large resource stations can also benefit from participation in a variety of “mid career” development and training programs offered by UC/Berkeley, USC/Annenberg and Mills College. These programs include a wide array of conferences and workshops as well as more intensive fellowship programs on a variety of topics including health, political issues including security and civil liberties, justice, environment, science, technology, diversity, K-12 education and the arts to name a few. Many of these echo the editorial priorities ranked by California stations in the LNI survey.In addition to in-person career development opportunities, brown bag “webinars” could be developed to make the deepening and broadening of editorial expertise accessible to all California stations.
There is also interest in finding ways to using new media platforms to ore closely link California stations. One idea suggested was to engage the KPBS Jacobs Fellows to help stations explore new multi-platform tools for California stations. This work could begin by assessing the “wish lists” of the high resource stations, The California Report and other programming produced for statewide distribution.
Questions?
