APME "TOOL KIT" TO OFFER IDEAS ON RETAINING MINORITY JOURNALISTS

This year's major project for the APME Credibility Committee is actually a joint effort with APME's Diversity Committee and a joint project between APME and UNITY. The goal is to come up with best practices, or a "toolkit," for newsrooms on how newspapers can do a better job of retaining minority journalists over the long term. In some markets, newspaper struggle to attract minority journalists. Others attract minority candidates to their newspapers, but struggle to keep them there for very long. As an industry, we can do better. To that end, APME's credibility and diversity committees are working to schedule three roundtables across the country on the issue of retaining minority journalists. One will be in Wilmington, Del., on Feb. 13. Others follow in Newark, Ohio, on March 6 and Palm Beach, Fla., on March 9. Each roundtable will consist of 12 to 15 participants and we hope to get a good mix of perspective – folks who are new to the business, people who are newspaper veterans and those who, for whatever reason, chose to leave the business. It's our intention to have a tool kit published by mid-year. We expect it to be filled with lots of great ideas managers can customize for their newsrooms.

Another project the Credibility Committee hopes to tackle this year is introducing newspapers to the idea of making their news operations more transparent to their communities. Based on the Sunshine Sunday model we've all come to know well, we hope to get a commitment from at least a handful of newspapers this year who will set aside a day to devote to opening up their operations to the public. If you're interested in learning more about the roundtables or the transparent newsroom project, contact Credibility chairwoman Jennifer Houtman. Houtman is managing editor of the Marietta (Ohio) Times; co-chair is Antoinette Taylor-Thomas, managing editor of the Lancaster (Ohio) Eagle Gazette.

DIFFERENT TAKES ON DIVERSITY

The tradition of tamale-making around the holidays is well-known in some parts of the country. But in others, where Hispanic immigrants are taking root, tamales provide a window into a community by way of its cuisine. That was the case recently at the Greensboro (N.C.) News & Record. The newspaper and its online team produced a multimedia piece that'll make you hungry to rip off a corn husk and dive into the warm meat-and-chile filling. The piece includes an audio slideshow documenting a family undertaking the hourslong process of making tamales. In an audio interview, the paper's food columnist also offers tips on tamales – the fillings, the sauces and the assembly of dough and husks.

At The Roanoke (Va.) Times, that window into a community came through a fitness activity – the Afro-Brazilian martial art of capoeira. A local college professor recently founded the area's first capoeira club, starting with just a few members working out in a cinderblock room. The multimedia package introduces the history of the sport, which was practiced by African slaves in Brazil centuries ago and considered illegal to play there until the late 1920s. It also shows you, step by step, how to execute moves such as the ginga and the queixada.

Athletics was also the focus of a notable multimedia piece at the Watertown (N.Y.) Daily Times. Managing editor Bob Gorman played a role in making it happen: "For me, diversity is ... getting people of different backgrounds together. So I organized a day where the basketball team at Syracuse University (my kid's on the team) spent the day with soldiers at Fort Drum. This multimedia package has been our most popular one as the university and Fort Drum have posted it to their Web sites, so we've gotten a lot of hits from alumni and soldiers around the world."

SUPPORT JOURNALISM BETTERMENT THROUGH THE APME FOUNDATION

Last year the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation, and the Ford Foundation banded together and pledged $73,000 to APME if we can raise $146,000. This kind of grant does not happen every day. Several journalism organizations got money from these same funders, but only one was pledged more than APME. In a great show of faith in the organization, Suki Dardarian, APME's president at the time, increased the goal to $152,000 to make the total $225,000. We will use most of the money to continue to professionalize and fortify APME as an essential organization serving the needs of newsroom leaders today. That includes sustaining NewsTrain, which has conducted effective and popular (frequently oversubscribed) professional training sessions for nearly 3,000 newsroom staffers across the nation. If you're interested in learning more, contact Hank Klibanoff, the APME Challenge Fund chair, by e-mail or at (404) 526-5416. Klibanoff is managing editor/news at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

SAVE THE DATE

This year's annual conference will be Oct. 3-6 in Washington, D.C. There are two big reasons to join us. We'll have one of the first tours of the new Newseum. And we guarantee you'll go home with 500 ideas for your newsroom. All managing editors, online editors, assistant managing editors, deputy managing editors and senior editors are invited.

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