No hand wringing. No preaching. No recriminations. What we need are some new initiatives, because we know things aren’t looking good, and we seem to have lost whatever momentum we had. And we need to regain it.
That’s the way Diane McFarlin, president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors, kicked off what was billed as a Diversity Summit held recently at the Freedom Forum in Nashville.
There were 30 people gathered at the round table, representing the corporate suites, the editors’ offices, the minority journalism associations, foundations and the training organizations.
Indeed, it was the choir, but ASNE’s and McFarlin’s hope is that the hymn will reverberate beyond those walls. If not, the diversity benchmarks for newspapers, originally set 25 years ago and updated a few years ago, will simply fade away as if they were written in sand on a windy day.
The overall mission is simple to remember: The percentage of journalists of color in the newsrooms of the nation’s daily newspapers should reach parity with the percentages of minorities in the general population by 2025 or earlier.
To reach the immediate goal, newspapers would need 15.55 percent journalists of color in newsrooms by the end of this year. Last year’s count: 12.07. As Diane said, it’s not looking too good. More like awful. And the hill gets steeper each year.
At the end of the summit, there were a lot of ideas on the table, and the ASNE leadership will determine what they believe is the best way to go.
Should they embrace the national readership study model that has gathered a lot of interest and support in the industry? What about a series of leadership workshops around the country which deal with: the specifics of recruiting, retention and promotion; managing a diverse newsroom; talking across our differences; and other essential issues? What about more programs to interest more young people in our craft, especially those within our own communities?
What can we do about changing the culture of newsrooms, which some have defined as more like the military than ever before? How do we attract minorities to the smaller markets? And what about studying the best practices, looking at those newsrooms which have achieved parity? How did they do it and what can be duplicated at other newspapers?
The biggest question of all remains, what now?Greg Moore, editor of the Denver Post and ASNE diversity chair, perhaps said it best. “There is a lack of momentum for diversity in our industry now. We need provocative ideas.”
And there is no better time than the present, said Charles Overby, president of the Freedom Forum. Time to come together and to work together, one on one, brick by brick. If we don’t, he added, we will fail.
Many of the other voices that were heard amplified Greg’s and Charles’ and Diane’s concerns. Here are some of those comments:
We need to reverse the trend of people leaving our newsrooms. People need to feel they are being valued. Quality and diversity are inseparable. If the CEOs get it, it will happen; if not, it won’t happen. Journalists of color need the opportunity to tell stories that are authentic and important to them. Why is it difficult to have an honest, open discussion about race in most newsrooms?
We changed the industry’s thinking on readership and credibility, why can’t we do it on diversity? We need to re-energize the conversation right now. We need to give the change agents the necessary tools, and we need to educate people so they can train others. Most of us are not willing to say or do what it takes to bring about a cultural change.
There also were some encouraging moments:
- Dean Singleton, head of MediaNews Group and this year’s chair of the Newspaper Association of America, invited ASNE to send a delegation to the next NAA board meeting, as well as to the diversity meeting planned later this year. That hasn’t happened in a while.
- Scripps-Howard’s Michael Phillips pledged to work with the National Association of Hispanic Journalists at six or seven smaller newspapers to test NAHJ’s proposed parity project.
But the biggest question of all remains, what now?
How can the momentum be regained? And how can we get folks from the top to the bottom to buy into not only the necessity, but the fairness and righteousness, of ASNE’s goal?
As Charles Overby said, if we can’t, we will fail. And failure shouldn’t be an option.