Ethnic Media on the Trail

A group of ethnic media journalists are covering the Democratic National Convention thanks to the assistance of New America Media (NAM), a McCormick grantee.

NAM organized the network, arranged credentials for the reporters and funded travel costs for the 14-member network. NAM, headed by media guru Sandy Close, is the nation's largest nonprofit dedicated to broadening opportujities for ethnic news organizations. Although the ethic media is said to reach an audience of more than 50 million, typically few ethnic journalists have had the ways and means to attend national political conventions.

The 14 reporters covering the Dems in Denver are:

• Eduardo de Oliveira, New England Ethnic News (Boston, Mass.)
• Randy Stelly, The Real Views (Baton Rouge, La.)
• Erline Andrews, Caribbean Life (New York City, N.Y.)
• Judith Martinez, Atlanta Latino (Atlanta, Ga.)
• Cindy Yurth, The Navajo Times (Navajo, Ariz.)
• Gregg Morris, The Word (Hunter College, N.Y.)
• Jacqueline Fernandez, The Word (Hunter College, N.Y.)
• Kisha Allison, The Word (Hunter College, N.Y.)
• Jonathan Mena, The Word (Hunter College, N.Y.)
• Kaiping Liu, The World Journal (San Francisco, Calif.)
• Zuag Kimberly Chang, Hmong Today (Minneapolis, Minn.)
• Ashahed Muhammad, The Final Call (Chicago, Ill.)
• Roberto Lovato, New America Media (New York City, N. Y.)
• Anthony Advincula, New America Media (New York City, N.Y.)

They're joined by their credentialed ethnic media counterparts organized by the NY Community Media Alliance, another MF grantee in the sector.

For more info on the NAM cohort, visit: http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=5f56768fa66560ba45f241e7c661e209.

NAM also received credentials for two of its 10 applicants for the Republican convention next week. Their work will be available online as well.

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Climate Change Reporting Opp - Apply Now!

Are you writing about major droughts or trying to explain the science behind rapidly melting glaciers? Do you want to better understand climate change, its impact on your community and how govermnents plan to respond?

If so, you can join a select group of journalists from across the country for this all-expenses paid Climate Change conference. This cutting-edge environmental conference, one of four Specialized Reporting Institutes that McCormick funds each year, will take place Oct. 12-14 at the John Glenn School of Public Affairs at The Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio.

For more information, go to http://mccormickc3.com/overview/overview.html.

Applications, which are due Sept. 8, are at: http://mccormickc3.com/application/McC3_Application.pdf.

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Kudos to Fernando Diaz of The Chicago Reporter

The Chicago Reporter’s Fernando Diaz has been awarded the 2008 Emerging Journalist of the Year by the National Association of Hispanic Journalists. He will be honored at the NAHJ’s 23rd annual Noche de Triunfos Journalism Awards Gala Sept. 12 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Among the reasons Diaz was selected were his “desire to converge to other media platforms, develop the magazine’s Internet coverage, adapt stories for Spanish-language television and uncover information that the entire community should know,” according to a letter by Iván Román, executive director of the association.

Diaz, 29, has worked at the Reporter – an investigative monthly magazine that identifies, analyzes and reports on the social, economic and political issues facing metropolitan Chicago - since October covering issues of immigration, criminal justice, and government and politics. In just 10 months he has produced projects:
• Documenting the burden families face in staying connected to relatives at faraway Illinois prisons
• The challenges threatening the state’s plan to integrate immigrants
• The success and failures suburban municipalities face in adapting to a growing immigrant population.

Along with his work at the Reporter, Diaz is currently a Fellow with the Institute for Justice and Journalism at the University of Southern California Annenberg School of Communication, working on a story about immigrants in the military. This MF-funded program allowed 10 reporters covering immigration and their editors to attend intensive training and site visits to the U.S.-Mexico border, Los Angeles and New York City.

For more on Diaz and his prestigious award, go to http://www.chicagoreporter.com/events/index.php/item/Diaz_Named_%27Emerging_Journalist_of_the_Year%27.

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Tap into the Money

Looking to learn more about how to raise money from individuals? We thought we'd share the beta site for the Challenge Fund for Journalism's new Capacity Building for Journalism Web site at www.CapacityBuildingforJournalism.com. This evolving hub provides free step-by-step resources for getting people to give to nonprofit journalism groups, and includes sections on capital campaigns, donor research, board development and more.

Check it out and start cashing in.

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First Place for the First

The Illinois First Amendment Center, an MF grantee since its origins in 2001, is taking home a highly-coveted First Amendment Award from the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ). The award recognizes individuals and groups for "extraordinarily strong efforts to preserve and strengthen the First Amendment . " SPJ will also honor former USA Today reporter Toni Locy , who has refused to reveal her sources from stories in a 2002 anthrax case.

IFAC works to educate young people about the need to understand, preserve and protect the First Amendment. What started as a modest effort housed at the Illinois Press Foundation has grown into a booming non-profit organization, providing free curriculum, posters, videos and other materials to thousands of K-12 teachers across the country. It recently began offering its materials in Spanish as well. The Center works closely with newspapers to promote its materials and host an annual conference.

IFAC will pick up the honor at SPJ's annual convention, to be held Sept. 6 in Atlanta. For more, visit: http://www.spj.org/news.asp?REF=819#819

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