In the spring of 2022, the American Press Institute introduced its Inclusion Index, under the direction of Letrell Crittenden, Ph.D., director of inclusion and audience growth. One of the first applications of the Index was launched in Pittsburgh, where API worked with the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation and five news organizations in the metropolitan region to assess and improve how multiple news organizations in a single area cover communities of color. 

The collaboration was based on the idea that news organizations in an ecosystem can work together to address gaps in their journalism that have left communities of color inaccurately represented or overlooked altogether in coverage. While newsrooms don’t always collaborate on news — indeed, they often deliberately compete with one another — they need to understand that communities often view the media as a collective. That perception of “the media” as monolithic means it is critical that news organizations assess how they serve communities of color not only on an individual basis, but collectively as well. Realizing that need, the five Pittsburgh newsrooms in this cohort generously agreed to participate in this project as a way to better understand the ecosystem in which they operate, to address gaps in that coverage and to position themselves to better represent their audiences. 

What follows is a summary of that work, starting with the cohort’s inclusion scores and ending with recommendations for effective ways they can work as a whole to improve the Pittsburgh media ecosystem.

Inclusion Index Scores and Highlights

Evaluation of Pittsburgh media, with an emphasis on cohort participants, using API’s Inclusion Index.

Diversity – 2.5

• While there has been some movement, newsrooms indicated that diversity within newsrooms has not reached parity (36%) with the diverse population of Pittsburgh, although they are collectively close to parity with Allegheny County (22%).  
• Some newsrooms have innovative diversity initiatives to recruit local talent.  
• Newsrooms have made an effort to recruit diverse interns.
• Newsrooms could use more formalized plans for recruitment.
• Retention is an issue, as journalists of color often leave local newsrooms after a few years.  

Inclusion – 1.5

• Pittsburgh newsrooms have had struggles related to internal culture, some that have erupted into high-profile public disputes.
• Issues include wage concerns, burnout and a lack of mentorship opportunities. 
• Newsrooms should consider developing more formal policies geared toward helping newsroom workers thrive within their current positions. This includes opportunities for specialized training programs and more mentorship opportunities.  

Representation – 2.0

• Pittsburgh newsrooms have long struggled with fair and equal representation of African Americans, as noted by two separate studies conducted and released by the Heinz Endowments in 2011 and 2020. 
• Local residents of color expressed concerns that they do not feel their communities are accurately and adequately represented on a regular basis by local media.  
• Some newsrooms, however, have made an effort to do more to highlight communities of color via special sections. This is a start, but we feel these efforts should extend beyond specialized coverage. 

Engagement – 1.5

• Pittsburgh newsrooms, in most cases, lack formal community engagement teams utilized by many newsrooms across the nation.  
• Engagement also does not take place routinely outside of the story gathering process. 
• Local residents expressed a desire to have more direct engagement with local media on a routine basis.  

Trust – 1.0

• Residents of color expressed feelings of deep distrust for local media across the board.  
• This has been intensified by a significant number of public occurrences over the past eight years. These include offensive editorials and columns, public mistreatment of reporters of color, racist statements made by local reporters and questionable decisions related to coverage of communities of color.  
• This disdain is generalized. This means distrust is broadly applied to newsrooms regardless of extent of perceived harm to the community. 

Assets – 1.0

• Asset mapping is a more complex tool used to understand communities. For our purposes, it is a process of understanding and tracking the key influencers, organizations and sites of communication within a community. It is not often deployed by newsrooms. But due to the lack of source tracking and engagement, there is little evidence that precursory work toward asset mapping is in place. 

Summary 

I want (Pittsburgh media) to know that we’re human, and that the stories they tell should be strengths based, and asset based and . . . historically informed about the neighborhood.

“ ”

– local Black resident to members of Pittsburgh media, November 2022

We deserve resources that we don’t have today and we deserve different coverage. I also would like the media to know that they hold power to harm us individually . . . (when) they cast a negative connotation on our identities, and that can harm us at the end of the day.

“ ”

– another local Black resident to members of Pittsburgh media, November 2022. 

The Pittsburgh news media ecosystem has significant deficiencies when it comes to inclusive practices both inside and outside of the newsroom. The failure of the ecosystem to progress in this area is especially disappointing, given that this issue specific to Pittsburgh newsrooms has been well publicized over the past decade. Nevertheless, the willingness of the five newsrooms in this cohort to participate in such a critique is a first step toward change. Additionally, each newsroom has implemented some policies that, if expanded upon or adopted by other newsrooms, could provide the basis for larger transformations related to Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging, or DEIB, in journalism. The American Press Institute hopes that overcoming these challenges will be done not only on an individual basis by newsrooms, but as a collaborative effort, especially when it comes to creating a hiring pipeline and improving efforts to listen to and engage communities of color. 

Sign up to get future updates on API’s Inclusion Index and DEIB work. Download the full report here.

Chapter 2

Background

Previous research and other articles – DEIB and Pittsburgh news ecosystem

Issues related to DEIB and Pittsburgh news media have been explored going back a decade. In 2011, the Heinz Endowments released a two-part study, Portrayals and Perception, Two Audits of the News Media Reporting on African American Men and Boys. The study’s content analysis, which focused on television news, the Tribune-Review and the Post-Gazette, found that African American men featured in news coverage appeared in crime stories more than 40% of the time, and sports stories 30% of the time. In 2020, Heinz commissioned a second study, this time more prominently emphasizing both African American men and women. This follow-up found that virtually nothing had changed in terms of news representations. About 75% of the stories featuring African Americans were focused on crime/justice or sports. 

Newsroom diversity was the focus of a study conducted by the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation in 2016. This effort, which was based on self-reported newsroom surveys, found that participating newsrooms were underrepresented in terms of racial diversity. Newsroom workers of color only represented 9% of all employees, in comparison to 20% of Allegheny County residents and 35% of Pittsburgh residents. Additionally, the survey found that no participating newsroom had reporters of color assigned to cover issues related to education or urban neighborhoods, and only one reporter of color across all newsrooms was assigned to cover crime or government. Additionally, no participating newsrooms had a plan for increasing diversity, nor had they participated in any training related to DEIB. 

In 2017, a report from Media Impact Funders focused on the Pittsburgh news ecosystem also touched on issues related to DEIB. The report declared that the Steel City had a “comparatively vibrant media ecosystem” due to its breadth of media. It also suggested that Pittsburgh could eventually become a “bellwether for successful media practices.” Yet even in this largely positive report, the authors noted that issues of diversity were a major challenge for newsrooms. The report offered several recommendations, including tying foundation funding to diversity figures and the creation of pipelines for new diverse talent. 

A 2019 study commissioned by Columbia’s Tow Center (also written by the author of this report) focused on internal culture as it pertains to DEIB. This report, which was also published by the Columbia Journalism Review, found that newsroom workers of color were often frustrated with their work conditions. A lack of opportunities for growth and mentorship, dismay over the newsroom’s coverage of communities of color and a lack of connection to fellow newsroom workers and the city as a whole — dubbed “the Pittsburgh problem” in the report — were major factors behind why, in many cases, workers decided to leave Pittsburgh’s newsrooms. 

Chapter 3

Design and research

Intervention design

For this project, the American Press Institute, with the assistance of the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation, fielded interest from newsrooms to participate in this inaugural cohort. Our goal was to have a cohort inclusive of broadcast, digital-first and traditional print newsrooms working within the city. We also reached out to newsrooms specifically targeted to communities of color, and student newsrooms. After speaking with several, we selected five different newsrooms to participate in the cohort. These were the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Public Source, the Pittsburgh City Paper and Pitt News, the student newspaper of the University of Pittsburgh. No broadcast newsrooms decided to join the cohort. It also should be noted that no broadcast newsrooms opted to participate in the 2016 diversity study conducted by the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation. 

Following the selection of the cohorts, API conducted research in three phases. First, we had each newsroom complete a two-part survey. In the first part, newsrooms were asked questions related to diversity and internal newsroom culture. In the second part, we asked newsrooms about their coverage and engagement practices within the community. In the second phase, we conducted interviews with workers from each participating newsroom. These interviews, which were set up by the newsrooms, included editors, frontline reporters and business staff. Finally, we conducted a review of content from each newsroom. For each newsroom, we looked at two select weeks of articles from two separate months, using our Metrics for News and Source Matters news tracking tools.  

Following our research, we held a two-day cohort summit where we revealed our findings to each newsroom. Also during this summit, we provided a series of lessons on how to make improvements in each of the areas of the Index. This included lessons led by API staff on community engagement, lessons led by Trusting News staff on building trust back within communities, and a series of guest lectures focused on the development of mission metrics, the concepts surrounding Solidarity Journalism and discussions of internal culture within the newsroom. During this session, we also introduced the cohort to a framework to assist them with the development of strategic plans.  

Several months after the cohort sessions, API staff led two in-person community listening sessions that involved the newsrooms. In the first, the professional newsrooms heard perspectives from community members of color from the Pittsburgh region. In the second session, Pitt News listened to perspectives from students of color attending the University of Pittsburgh. A combined total of 18 people attended the sessions. This information was then used to inform our final report.  

Following the listening sessions, each team worked with consultants and API staff on their final strategic plans. Summaries of these plans can be found via this Twitter thread. They may also be found on the American Press Institute website. 

Research phase 

In addition to this extensive research specifically focused on the five participating newsrooms in this cohort, we also have included secondary material and other research collected by Letrell Crittenden, the lead author of this work. Crittenden has conducted previous research into the Pittsburgh media ecosystem. Permission to use research gathered for past projects related to the Pittsburgh news media ecosystem was granted to the author of this report by respondents.

In total, information used to compile this report came from the following sources:

• Six newsroom surveys completed by the participating cohort members (2022)
• 37 interviews of newsroom workers from participating cohort members (2022)
• Review of more than 800 articles, via API’s Source Matters and Metrics for News  
• Two community listening sessions (2022)
• 11 interviews with community members (2022 and 2020)
• 30 additional interviews with newsroom workers conducted in 2018 and 2020
• 12 additional community conversations conducted in 2018 and 2020  

Chapter 4

Summary of findings and Index scores

Explanation of Index scores – Need for results + infrastructure 

The following scores are based upon our Inclusion Index. A copy of the rubric for our Index can be found here.  

API’s index is based on measurements of seven key areas we feel are essential to building a strong connection with communities of color within an ecosystem.  

• Strong diversity within newsrooms 
• Strong inclusivity or belonging among newsroom workers of color 
• Avoidance of stereotypical coverage of communities of color 
• Strong engagement with communities of color 
• Development of strong trust of local newsrooms held by communities of color 
• Understanding of the key community assets essential to communities of color
• Creation of strong infrastructure designed to support DEIB efforts inside and outside the newsroom.

In our assessment, we have guidelines within our rubric for the scoring of the first six categories. But the seventh, infrastructure, is the final evaluative metric used for the first six categories. Simply put, efforts to develop remedies to the first six areas will not have sustained success unless a newsroom builds systems of change into everyday practices and ensures that such efforts receive the human and financial resources necessary to ensure their ongoing operation.  

For example, if the goal is to do better community engagement, what everyday practices have been built into your newsroom’s routines that allow this to happen on a regular basis? If the goal is to improve the diversity of your sourcing, what steps have been taken to track and evaluate the sources you typically use within your work? If the goal is to improve the diversity of applicant pools, what specific systems have been put in place during the hiring process to boost diversity among candidates? And in all cases, how are you routinely evaluating the success of these practices, and what steps are being taken to build on successes?  

Index ranking explanations

In terms of assessment, we base our scores on a scale of one to five. 

• At the bottom of the scale, we consider efforts that are virtually nonexistent to be reflective of invisibility. In this sense, efforts simply do not exist. 
• A score of two represents tokenism. Some efforts may have been taken, but they represent the bare minimum in terms of effort. No real infrastructure exists, and efforts are inconsistent. 
• Level three represents toleration on our scale. In this scenario, we find that the newsroom has some respect for the need for DEIB work and has some strong features in place. But in our assessment, much more could be done to improve efforts and build systems. Work is done, but the newsroom still lacks a full dedication to it. 
• A score of four represents acceptance of the need for change. Newsrooms have taken many steps toward building sustained DEIB efforts, and it has been embraced that these efforts are necessary for the everyday functioning of the newsrooms. 
• The top score, five, represents the ideal newsroom, one where all news workers and community members feel they can thrive within a respective newsroom or news ecosystem. DEIB is built into all systems, relationships are sound, news coverage is representative and few to no problems related to DEIB exist inside or outside of the newsroom.  

Index scores*

*(While only five newsrooms participated fully in this endeavor, because much of the information comes from community voices and from past studies, this should be considered a partial meta-analysis of the entire Pittsburgh ecosystem. Specific reports on each newsroom were produced, but per our agreement, will remain private to each newsroom.) These scores all represent our assessment of the cohort as a whole.

Diversity – 2.5**

If you continue to do things the same way, you’re going to always get the same results. And I suspect that the newsrooms are going to look the same, because they’re doing the same thing, because they’re protecting their little empire, I guess.

“ ”

– Community resident on lack of newsroom diversity

While in the cohort newsrooms in many cases are close to parity with Allegheny County, newsrooms freely admit they could do more to bring in more journalists of color. In terms of percentage, newsrooms are not much more diverse than they were during the 2016 PBMF audit. Newsrooms with openings over the past two years largely failed to bring in diverse candidates. They also lack strong plans for recruiting diverse talent. Additionally, even when there are diverse internship programs in place, these internships rarely result in full-time positions. For this to change, newsrooms will have to rethink how they recruit candidates of color. Doing the same thing, as noted above, will not yield changes.  

Positives

Diversity in internships. Across the board, the professional newsrooms in this cohort have emphasized hiring diverse interns. Each newsroom has had diverse interns over the past two years, and, in some cases, multiple interns of color. This is highlighted by the internship program at the Tribune-Review, which provides scholarships to promising high school students of color, who subsequently intern in the newsroom during summer breaks. Additionally, all four professional newsrooms had interns of color at some point in 2022, and in some cases more than one.  

Negatives 

Failure to hire diverse staff in recent searches. Professional newsrooms noted that they struggled to hire diverse candidates during recent hiring cycles. In some cases, diverse candidates were finalists, but ultimately opted for other positions. Salary and concerns over working and living in Pittsburgh were cited as reasons that candidates opted for other opportunities. 

Lack of concrete hiring plans/local pipelines. While all newsrooms have made strides in hiring more diverse talent, they lack — for the most part — coherent recruitment plans. In many cases, recruiting efforts are passive. At best, such efforts focus on advertising with affinity organizations like the National Association of Black Journalists or the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, or tagging these organizations during job searches. Newsrooms are not building long-term relationships with journalists, recruiters or universities that can specifically bring them a steady stream of diverse candidates. While newsrooms have talked about creating local pipelines, most have not taken steps to do so. An exception, as noted, is the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.  

High turnover rate among staff members of color. As noted in the CJR study, and as highlighted recently by several high-profile departures from newsrooms, journalists of color often do not stay long within Pittsburgh newsrooms. In some cases, they move from newsroom to newsroom. But in most cases, journalists only stay in the city for a short period before departing. Some of this is related to factors outside of the newsroom, related to Pittsburgh’s quality-of-life issues for people of color, notably Black women. But this high turnover has been a hindrance to sustaining diversity within the newsroom.  

**The findings in this category are based on cohort member newsrooms.

Inclusion – 1.5

I think people need to be in an environment where they feel comfortable expressing who they are without having to worry about any type of consequences.

“ ”

– Former Pittsburgh reporter, as cited in CJR

The Pittsburgh news ecosystem has had a large number of internal disputes go public. While we will not report on our findings about individual newsrooms for this public-facing report, per our agreement with them, many newsrooms over the past several years have seen their internal conflicts become top stories for market competitors. Staff members in Pittsburgh newsrooms who have come forward publicly have addressed concerns over low pay, burnout, harassment, identity-focused discrimination and poor communication. 

Positives 

Internal diversity committees. A number of newsrooms have internal diversity committees to look into issues related to DEIB. These groups have already had some success in addressing major issues. For example, as was highlighted in its public presentation, the diversity program established by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review was developed by its diversity committee. But there is more these groups could do to advocate for change. We feel they should meet more frequently and take on more challenges, particularly with regard to internal culture and community engagement. 

Negatives

Lack of routine newsroom-wide conversations or training around DEIB or internal culture. Even with the recent so-called racial reckoning in America, newsrooms in this cohort have, for the most part, failed to implement DEIB staff training, nor have they held regular conversations related to DEIB across the newsroom. If conversations happen, they are limited to editors, or select silos within the newsroom. Work from existing DEIB committees has not resulted in larger conversations across the newsrooms. 

Burnout. Workload management and burnout were common themes. While some newsrooms have wisely implemented efforts to deal with mental health, each newsroom should take stock of how employees are dealing with the stress related to their everyday work, particularly in newsrooms that have experienced downsizing or are otherwise understaffed. All newsrooms should invest in mental health wellness programs, and structure routine check-ins with employees to gauge how they are feeling about their work/life balance. 

Lack of formal mentorship. Many newsrooms have younger reporters, yet the amount of mentorship they receive from senior staff members is imbalanced. Each newsroom should consider developing or redeveloping mentorship programs that have higher degrees of contact among staff members. These connections should focus on both work and work/life balance issues. Training on best practices should also be made readily available to not only junior staff, but all staff members. 

Concerns over compensation. Another issue expressed repeatedly related to salaries. Many workers feel they are not earning enough, especially as staff cutbacks have increased workloads.  

No formal policies for addressing grievances of frontline workers. Newsrooms lacked clear-cut policies on how employees can file concerns, or what happens with concerns once they are raised. Newsrooms mentioned that “open-door” policies existed but had no clear guidance on what happens with concerns, or how conflicts are resolved.  

Representation – 2.0

I also don’t think that they do a great job at covering any stories besides negative stories. Black issues are really just oftentimes covering trauma, and covering horrible incidences of things that have happened. And there’s just a ton of examples.

“ ”

 – Black resident of McKeesport 

There are two parts of understanding a newsroom’s representation of a community. One involves assessing the actual content produced by a newsroom. The second is understanding how a community perceives coverage by newsrooms of their communities. Even if a newsroom is trying to cover communities differently, this may not have an impact if community members do not notice the changes.  

Our own analysis of individual newsrooms is private to each one, per our agreement with them. However, other studies in the past have shown a clear tendency of some newsrooms to overemphasize crime coverage and sports coverage of communities of color. We also found that newsrooms tend to rely on official sources for stories. Newsroom employees were also often critical of their own coverage, stating that they don’t do a good job of getting out and covering everyday experiences among communities of color — a view also held by community members. Newsrooms across the board have not conducted their own audits of content, and no newsroom has a formal way of collecting and tracking diverse sources. 

Engagement –  1.5

There’s a lot of good that doesn’t get covered. Because again, if you’re not engaging with the community, then you don’t know what’s happening in the community, except at that moment where you go to cover that story. And if you’re more engaged, then you’re aware of other things that are happening that are good stories.

“ ”

– Pittsburgh resident on engagement

Routine efforts to engage African Americans and other communities of color in Pittsburgh are virtually nonexistent. Newsroom workers suggested that most efforts were rare, and community members lamented that they would rarely see reporters in their communities or covering their organizations. Simply put, in most cases, newsrooms lack contemporary methods of directly engaging communities of color. 

Positives

Some basic work was being done. Then the pandemic hit. Most newsrooms have conducted engagement-type work in the past, notably prior to the pandemic. Some community events were held. Some set up tables at public events to personally engage with their communities. This work, however, was not routine. And then it was impeded by the pandemic. Newsrooms also have individuals who work in audience engagement to varying degrees, though in most cases this work is focused on data and not on direct engagement with community members. 

Negatives

Newsrooms lack the types of direct community engagement teams or investments used by newsrooms across the nation today. Most newsrooms do not have a distinct team focused on community engagement outside of social media. They do not actively get out into the community to attend meetings or meet people. They do not have community advisory boards that can provide feedback. Systems do not exist for feedback from community members given through digital media. Newsrooms also do not hold events on a regular basis with community members, they do not conduct surveys or focus groups, nor do they find ways to work in the community as a means of being present. This type of engagement work is necessary to build trust, but it requires an investment of time and other resources. 

It is possible, however, that the newsrooms in this cohort could find ways to collaborate on some macro-level engagement efforts (community events/listening sessions, community advisory boards, community asset maps and information needs assessments), while attempting to build out internal engagement infrastructures. But this work is essential for all newsrooms in the Pittsburgh ecosystem, especially given the very significant trust gap that exists between Pittsburgh newsrooms and communities of color. 

Newsrooms are not given time to do engagement. Probably the biggest hindrance to engaging community members is that reporters feel they do not have the time to get out into the community and simply listen. When reporters are out in the community, the expectation is that they will be working on stories. There are no policies or incentives to have reporters simply get to know community members or follow up with people they have interviewed in the past outside the scope of a story. The lack of follow-up was noted by several community members, and helped fuel the resentment these citizens had for the approaches of local newsrooms. In this sense, the newsrooms are acting in an extractive manner with their communities. They go in to mine stories, but they fail to return once the story-gathering process is complete. This work, however, is possible with greater investment of time toward engagement work. 

There are no newsletters or other materials designed for communities of color. Another area for potential improvement is in newsletters and other niche news products directed toward specific communities. Several newsrooms across the nation have had great success with building newsletters to serve communities of color. Newsrooms can often use existing materials to develop such products. Cohort newsrooms in some cases have newsletters, but they are not specifically targeted toward communities of color. This is also a potential area for collaboration. 

Trust –  1.0 

You probably are familiar with Wendy Bell, but a lot of the controversy around some of the things that she said, in regards to black residents, Black Lives Matter and things like that are very offensive and problematic and racist at the end of the day, and they took a very long time to get rid of her on the radio. And so that definitely was a deterrent for me.

“ ”

– Pittsburgh resident on trust level for local media

It would be like me having faith in the government to change or, you know, policing.

“ ”

– Black community activist on why he thinks local media will never serve communities of color. 

The lack of engagement, combined with numerous, often nationally recognized racial and cultural incidents across multiple newsrooms, has eroded trust for the Pittsburgh news media ecosystem among communities of color. It is not an exaggeration to say that Pittsburgh media has had multiple controversies involving the representation of communities of color every year going back eight years. These include multiple controversies involving anchor and commentator Wendy Bell, multiple problematic columns and editorials, the very public sidelining of Alexis Johnson and Michael Santiago at the Post-Gazette during the height of the Black Lives Matter protests in Pittsburgh, the mislabeling of journalists of color in a video recording of a forum on race and media, and stories, disputed by local police, that inaccurately said the victim of a police shooting was seen firing a weapon before he was killed. 

Newsrooms need to understand that communities often view the media as a collective. The sins of one become the sins of others. In our interviews, television news loomed large in the minds of people interviewed, but they rarely offered favorable opinions of other news outlets, or referred to them as “trusted.” Even when positives were discussed, the emphasis was often on specific journalists — often of color — as opposed to entire newsrooms. For this to be overcome, the newsrooms collectively need to do a better job with community engagement, representation and balance in coverage and hiring more diverse staff and helping staff members to thrive. Newsrooms must also have a strong understanding of key community assets essential for telling the full stories of communities. In short, dealing with the other issues related to the Index are essential for building trust.

Newsrooms must also recognize the need to be open and transparent about their approaches, which can differentiate them and build trust. Explainer posts on a homepage detailing how the newsroom makes decisions about stories, sources and other items may help with this differentiation.  

More specifics related to trust will be relayed within individual reports. 

Assets – 1.0

Asset mapping is a more complex tool used to understand communities. For our purposes, it is a process of understanding and tracking the key influencers, organizations and sites of communication within a community. Producing an asset map can be done several different ways, including the example demonstrated in this video. In all cases, significant research about a community must take place before a map is produced.  It is not often deployed by newsrooms. But due to the lack of source tracking and engagement, there is little evidence that precursory work toward asset mapping is in place. 

Infrastructure –  1.5

Newsrooms across the board lack systems and processes to do DEIB work. There are no recruiting systems, no newsroom inclusivity systems, no systems for better representation, no systems for engagement and no evidence of asset mapping. For efforts to work and be sustained amid job transitions, role turnover and demographic change within the community, these systems must be created along with the improvements geared toward DEIB.

Chapter 5

Key ecosystem recommendations

Recommendations

1. Build up and support local talent pipelines, and do so on a coordinated basis

While Pittsburgh newsrooms need to do a better job of recruiting diverse talent, there is evidence that a pipeline problem does exist. Pittsburgh may not be seen as an attractive destination for many journalists of color who can pursue opportunities in other, more diverse markets. The best way to bring diverse talent into newsrooms — and keep them there — may be to develop local pipelines that train people of color to become journalists. This can begin in high school, but a pipeline for adults interested in journalism should also be considered. Such an effort could be done collaboratively, and it would make sense to build on existing programs, such as the Frank Bolden Urban Multimedia Workshop. 

2. Strengthen community engagement efforts, including collaborating with other newsrooms when feasible 

Trust cannot be rebuilt without a strong investment in community engagement. This will require time and money. But as mentioned, newsrooms in Pittsburgh don’t do much engagement, and only one newsroom within the cohort has a dedicated engagement team. This lack of infrastructure, however, may offer an opportunity for newsrooms in Pittsburgh to think more collaboratively when it comes to engagement. During our joint listening session in November, representatives from four different newsrooms sat in to listen to the concerns of local residents. This is something that could be done routinely and collaboratively. Additionally, separate newsrooms could find ways to create and sustain community advisory committees that could inform them of issues on a collaborative basis. If resources are indeed the problem, cross-newsroom collaboration could provide a way of investing in community engagement.  

3. Make a greater effort to ensure that newsroom staff members have the chance to thrive 

Arguably, the biggest impediment to endeavors focused on improving DEIB is related to internal structure and culture. It is extremely difficult for newsrooms in distress to tackle larger challenges related to DEIB. They will lack the staffing, morale, organization, and thus the ability, to develop the types of infrastructures required for sustained improvements and changes. These newsrooms also may struggle with retention issues, which directly impact newsroom diversity. Newsrooms must begin the process of assessing their overall health and begin to put in place structures and processes to ensure that all staff members can thrive. This could include stronger onboarding processes, mentorship programs, funded opportunities for training, access to mental health professionals and strong policies related to harassment and abuse. Newsrooms should also consider specialized training focused on these issues, and have them on a routine basis.  

4. Build infrastructure that allows you to assess your own newsgathering practices, notably as they pertain to sourcing and content. And take a look at your style guides, too!

None of this work will have lasting impact if newsrooms do not assess their efforts on a regular basis. Source auditing, content auditing, asset mapping and community listening all help newsrooms make such assessments. While some of this may cost money, there are steps newsrooms can take to do this work at a lower cost. For example, a simple spreadsheet that contains the names of sources could be a way to begin tracking the types of sources being used, how and how often, in stories. Efforts to systematically review content, sources and practices will help solve issues of representation, even if they are not the most high-tech endeavors.  

5. Collaborate, collaborate, collaborate! 

If we have not repeated it enough, this project represents an opportunity for newsrooms to think about how they can collectively work to better cover communities of color and to recruit and retain diverse newsrooms. Newsrooms should find ways to work together. 

Chapter 6

Limitations of report/intervention and future research

One of the major limitations of this work is that we were unable to secure participation from a broadcast outlet. This is significant, since many local residents noted that much of the news they receive comes from local broadcast media. To get a full understanding of how an ecosystem operates, it is imperative that broadcasters participate in DEIB work. As was noted, all broadcast stations opted out of a 2016 survey, and they have largely not been involved in other local projects, notably the Pittsburgh Media Partnership.  

Additionally, because we only had access to the data of participating newsrooms, we did not conduct a detailed analysis of content from newsrooms outside these five cohort members, via our Source Matters and Metrics for News tools. We feel strongly, however, that the work conducted by the Heinz Endowments is reflective of the current conditions in Pittsburgh newsrooms, and as such, represents an accurate picture for assessment of news content in Pittsburgh. We also believe that a follow-up to the 2016 diversity survey conducted by the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation is needed for the entire news ecosystem.