The story made headlines across the country: low literacy rates affect access to justice in family courts as the number of people acting as their own lawyer increases.
Lawyer and freelance journalist Valerie Mutton originally wrote the story for The Lawyer’s Weekly after winning ABC’s Peter Gzowski Life Literacy Fellowship, a research grant of $3,000 to write about adult literacy in Canada. Then Canadian Press picked up the story, and it spread.
It’s a story that may not have been told without the media fellowship, says Nikki Luscombe, ABC Life Literacy Canada’s communications manager.
Nonprofits funding the news
ABC Life Literacy Canada has long valued the role of journalists in raising public awareness about issues important to the organization. Nearly 20 years ago, the charitable foundation set up an award of merit to recognize a member of the media they determined had produced journalism that promoted adult literacy in Canada.
Two years ago, the organization changed its approach.
“The media landscape is changing,” Luscombe says. “There’s lots of competition out there for eyeballs. And there are many competing stories.”
Rather than reward journalism that had already been published, the organization decided to foster journalism about adult literacy with a media fellowship.
“We wanted to make sure that literacy was still staying visible as an issue,” Luscombe says. “We wanted to remind journalists that this is a cause that should be near and dear to them, and so we thought it would make more sense if we proactively offer a fellowship.”
ABC’s observation is undeniable – traditional news media in Canada are struggling.
Following government budget cuts, the CBC cancelled programs and shut international bureaus. Citing a weak advertising market, Postmedia Network Inc. announced in May it was closing its wire service, cutting the Sunday editions of several papers and ending holiday editions. That same month, the Globe and Mail asked its staff to take unpaid leaves during the summer to reduce costs.
The cuts to Canadian media outlets affect the journalism, says the Canadian Association of Journalists president.
“When jobs are cut within a media company, Canadians often lose,” Hugo Rodrigues said in a press release last spring. “These positions help inform and educate Canadians about the news and information we need to have for a healthy, functioning democratic society.”
How the gap in reporting will be filled as commercial media’s budgets shrink is a much-discussed question.
In her 2006 report, On Behalf of Journalism: A Manifesto for Change, USC Annenberg journalism professor Geneva Overholser, wrote that a greater role for nonprofits in the industry could help the problem.
Promoting a charitable mandate
Like ABC, the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada has a long tradition of funding news. The foundation was created by an Act of Parliament in 1984. The first media fellowships were offered two years later. The fellowship has changed over time, but these days, the foundation offers about four fellowships a year of up to $10,000 depending on the proposal. So far, 98 fellowships have been awarded.
For the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, journalists play a critical role in fulfilling its mandate.
“The mandate of the foundation is to promote mutual awareness and understanding between Canada and Asia and also promote a dialogue,” says Trang Nguyen, communications manager with the foundation. “So the role of journalists in disseminating information and sharing views on Canada-Asia issues is critical.”
The benefits of the media fellowships for the foundation are long-lasting. Nguyen says the fellowships help build a cohort of journalists with an on-the-ground understanding of Asia and Asian issues. Many recipients have gone on to become important voices in Canada, including Chantal Hébert and Carol Off.
ABC Life Literacy Canada’s media fellowships help the organization achieve its goals too, Luscombe says.
“ABC’s mission is to inspire Canadians to increase their literacy skills. So we can do this in many ways, but a very effective way is to get stories out to the public eye. And mass media is a very effective way of doing that,” she says.
“By having these amazingly creative storytellers come in with new angles, it really helps to enliven the cause.”
Media outlets go nonprofit
The effects of cuts to the traditional news industry over time also has journalists looking for funding alternatives.
Bilbo Poynter was working as a freelance journalist when he began to consider joining the nonprofit sector.
“We were finding that there was a decided lack of resources for doing in-depth reporting within organizations and certainly outside of them if you were a freelancer.”
He became interested in the idea of creating a nonprofit investigative news outlet similar to models he had worked with in the United States. In 2009, he co-founded the Canadian Centre for Investigative Reporting (CCIR).
The number of organizations like the CCIR has grown rapidly in the United States. There are about 75 centres doing investigative and accountability reporting in the country. High-profile newspapers now regularly publish the work of nonprofit investigative centres. ProPublica, one of the best-known such centres in the US, has won two Pulitzer Prizes for its reporters’ work.
Poynter sees unique challenges to nonprofit media organizations in Canada.
“Effectively there’s much more money to be asked for in the US, and as well there are various individuals and organizations who prioritize issues like media access and freedom of information,” he says. “It’s one of their bedrock values.”
The ethics of nonprofit news
As nonprofit media centres become more common, some journalists and media scholars are questioning the ethics of funding models that depend on charitable donations.
Stephen Ward, a journalism ethics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, raised this question in an article published by J-Source: “Moreover, how do I know, as a reader, whether a foundation sponsoring a group of journalists has undue influence on the editorial process, including a veto on stories the foundation dislikes? Why assume that funding from a foundation is less fraught with possible conflicts then advertising from Zellers?”
It’s a question Poynter takes seriously. The CCIR has not accepted any donations from corporations or the government, and it has a clear editorial statement for potential donors.
The importance of editorial independence is something Tides Canada and The Tyee, an independent online magazine, take seriously in handling The Tyee Fellowships.
Tides Canada works with The Tyee to manage the funds of two $5,000 media fellowships for journalism projects related to British Columbia. An independent panel of journalism professors selects the winners.
An important element of the fellowship is that the work benefit the public rather than an individual, says Tides Canada’s communications manager Alison Henning, which means that the work must stay in the public sphere. The Tyee publishes the completed work, but it is then available for free publication elsewhere. Henning says the organizations make sure to explain to all applicants that they do not own their work.
Ultimately, Henning says, the work must be charitable.
Yet, whether journalism, particularly investigative journalism, should be considered a charitable cause is a hotly debated.
Earlier this year, the UK Charity Commission rejected a charitable status application from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism for a second time. The Bureau of Investigative Journalism is a university-based nonprofit organization in London, UK.
The House of Lords has addressed this question. The Lords published a report this year called The Future of Investigative Journalism. Citing pressing economic challenges, the Lords recommended the rules of charitable purposes be rewritten to include investigative journalism.
Poynter says the CCIR did not run into difficulties obtaining charitable status. The process took about a year and a half. The CCIR is registered as an educational organization.
An uncertain future
The long-term sustainability of news funded by philanthropy is unclear. Poynter acknowledges that depending on foundations to fund his centre’s investigative journalism is an ongoing challenge. That means nonprofit journalism won’t replace its commercial counterpart anytime soon.
Currently, news funded by nonprofits in Canada depends largely on for-profit big-name media outlets to garner attention.
Poynter is hopeful this will change.
“Commercial media are more and more dependent on the nonprofit sector for basically producing the type of material that they’ve determined for a host of reasons that they can no longer produce,” he says. “And it tends to be the in-depth investigative reporting that is the material that garners the awards, and thereby the attention, and thereby is one of the ways they’re able to succeed commercially.”
Despite an uncertain future, many journalists, scholars, and member of the charitable sector agree: nonprofit organizations have a role to play in fostering journalism.
According to The US Federal Communications Commission report The Information Needs of Communities the benefits are reciprocal.
“Without strong reporting, the issues that philanthropists care about – whether health, environment, children, fiscal responsibility – are all shortchanged.”
Get your nonprofit in the news: Six tips on funding journalism
1. Do it! “It’s been incredibly successful in the US, so much so that it has prompted traditional media to do a lot of soul-searching and in the meantime has produced all sorts of incredibly effective and compelling reporting,” Bilbo Poynter, co-founder of the Canadian Centre for Investigative Reporting. “It’s an effective use of your charitable resources. And public interest reporting is not as valued as it once was within news organizations. So the need is there.”
2. Consider funding or working with an existing nonprofit organization. Bilbo Poynter recommends that nonprofit organizations approach the CCIR to see how they can work together.
3. Follow the rules. Alison Henning, communications and marketing manager of Tides Canada, advises registered charities interested in establishing a media fellowship to make sure they understand the ins and outs as laid out by the Canada Revenue Agency.
4. Give the young guys a chance. “Think about partnering up with journalism schools, use those networks, and offer those opportunities to journalism students,” Trang Nguyen, communications manager of the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada. “I think that if there’s anyone we really want to reach out to it’s really that group.”
5. Make sure there are no string attached. “We recognize that there’s independence and (the journalists) want to write the story in their way,” Nguyen says. “It’s their own story, we just provide the support.”
6. Use social media and partnerships to promote the fellowship. “Pre-promotion is really important to get applicants,” says Nikki Luscombe, communications manager of ABC Life Literacy. “Repeating your message on social media is very helpful. Find your natural partnerships where you find like-minded people. And what’s great there is that social media naturally finds those people for you.”
Heather Yundt is a freelance radio and print journalist based in Ottawa. She can be reached at hyundt@gmail.com or on Twitter @hyundt.
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