Solutions Journalism used to be sort of a buzz word, a trend. I’d show up to conferences and inevitably find a session about it, half of which was spent explaining the concept and answering questions that started with, “No, this isn’t advocacy.” Continue reading Why I organized Narcan training for journalists
Category: Presentations
Panel moderation: What If Innovation Festival
Business and journalism rarely come together they way they should at conferences. So I was delighted to moderate a panel at the What If Innovation Festival last month at Temple University.
The festival was organized by and targeted to students at the Fox School of Business, and I moderated three lightening panels with Philadelphia entrepreneurs about starting, growing and sustaining young businesses. Continue reading Panel moderation: What If Innovation Festival
Panel appearance: Discussing news industry trends and obstacles with fellow Temple University alumni
What are the obstacles and opportunities in today’s media landscape? I spent a couple hours on the evening of April 23 talking about just that with David Board, dean of Temple University’s School of Media and Communication, and three of my fellow alumni: Kurtis Lee of the Los Angeles Times, David Wood of The Huffington Post and Steve Capus of CBS Evening News. Continue reading Panel appearance: Discussing news industry trends and obstacles with fellow Temple University alumni
Questioning Philly’s mayoral candidates at the Fox29 debate
Six Democrats are vying to be Philly’s next mayor, and with the primary less than a month away, Fox29 hosted one of three televised debates to get the candidates to talk about important Philly issues.
These candidates’ schedule are absolutely ridiculous, with one 60-hour stretch including no fewer than 10 debates. But televised debates are king because of the accessibility. Along with journalists from students from St. Joseph’s University and journalists from Fox, 900AM WURD and Al Dia, I represented Billy Penn on the panel. Continue reading Questioning Philly’s mayoral candidates at the Fox29 debate
My keynote address at the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association community engagement workshop
I had the opportunity Nov. 13 to geek out with other community managers and socially savvy reporters when the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association invited me to keynote their Sharon Johnson Memorial Workshop on community engagement.
My speech focused on what I refer to as “maximizing the message and minimizing the messenger” — basically, putting news and information ahead of an organization’s brand.
The work I do at Billy Penn revolves around engaging different communities according to their preferences, and making sure the first thing we do is inform them. So often — because it’s so easy for content to get lost online — news organizations make it a point to remind their audiences who’s informing them. Only News 1 spoke with this councilman about this issue! Our reporter Jane Schmo attended a major education meeting and has all the details for you! Where’s the information in those sentences? Why have we forgotten that our job as news professionals is to inform people?
I kept my speech to about 15 minutes so everyone at the workshop could have a full half-hour to ask questions of me and others, and to share their experiences with community engagement. There were about 25 people in attendance, and I think this is one of the most productive conversations about industry issues that I’ve been a part of in these workshop settings. It doesn’t matter if you work at a small startup like I do, at a legacy newspaper covering state politics, or for a smaller publication covering local issues — everyone has community engagement tales to tell and scars to show. Continue reading My keynote address at the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association community engagement workshop
Shannon Wink 