In April, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and the NAB Education Foundation (NABEF), along with partner organizations, unveiled the Awareness in Reporting Initiative and digital toolkit, AwarenessInReporting.org, to assist newsrooms in reporting on race. Joining NAB President and CEO Gordon Smith at the launch event were journalists, community leaders, news directors, journalism school deans and professors, who shared their experiences and recommendations for covering racially sensitive stories.
“Every day, newsrooms across the country face challenging questions regarding the coverage of communities of color. These stories can be among the most complicated for stations to cover since journalists understand that what they report can influence as well as reflect situations and circumstances in a community. NAB is proud to work alongside the NAB Education Foundation and our partner organizations to assist newsrooms in reporting on race,” said Smith during the launch event.
The toolkit on race is phase one of the Awareness in Reporting initiative, which aims to provide newsrooms with additional resources and guidelines covering other sensitive topics in the future. Planned for phase two is a toolkit on covering religion.