McCormick grant will expand Ethnic Media Watchdog Workshops

A $100,000 grant from the McCormick Foundation will allow us to continue and expand our Ethnic Media Watchdog program. The funding will support a series of regional workshops that will bring low-cost, high-quality training on local, regional and national topics to journalists working in small- to medium-sized ethnic media organizations in areas throughout the U.S. Participants learn techniques and tips that help them add depth to their stories and to do work that has greater impact in their communities.

To date, IRE has conducted Ethnic Media Watchdog seminars in Chicago, New York, Minneapolis and Atlanta for more than 200 journalists with support from McCormick and the New York Times Company Foundation and several partners. This new funding will allow IRE to bring the training to additional communities and improve and expand the program. The new series will begin in 2009 - please watch for the dates and locations on IRE's training Web page: www.ire.org/training.

One of the strongest components of this program has been its collaborative nature. We look forward to continuing to work with Brant Houston, Knight Chair at the University of Illinois and former executive director of IRE, New America Media and the Community Media Workshop in Chicago, as well as the University of Missouri School of Journalism, among other future partners.

"The Ethnic Media workshops are one of the most important initiatives that IRE has undertaken in recent years," says IRE executive director Mark Horvit. "Ethnic media are a vital, growing part of our industry, and we want to help provide techniques and resources for their passionate, community-based reporting. Working with these journalists has been a great collaborative process, and having them become members of IRE enriches our organization. We look forward to the new series."

If you are interested in having this training come to your area, please contact Mark at mhorvit@ire.org.