Beginning this fall, several North Country news organizations, including The Hill News, are launching an initiative designed to provide local residents with the opportunity to receive training and support for conducting independent, investigative journalism projects in their communities.

The SLCJI organizers invite proposals from North Country residents for specific reporting projects that can be carried out in their home communities between September 2018 and April 2019. Local high school and college/university students are especially encouraged to apply, but the program is open to anyone aged high school and up. Previous journalistic experience is not a requirement. Applications may be submitted through the webform found at http://www.weavenews.org/incubator. There is no fee for participation in the program, and accepted participants will have the opportunity to apply for funding for their work through the SLCJI’s small grants initiative.

The organizing committee will begin reviewing proposals immediately and will continue until the final proposal deadline of September 10, 2018. For more information, visit www.weavenews.org/incubator.

The project will begin with a one-day workshop to be held on the SLU campus on Saturday, Sept. 22, featuring presentations and training sessions led by outside experts and members of the four local media organizations. Participants will then spend several months carrying out their local journalism projects before presenting their work at a public symposium to be held in April.

“A healthy democracy requires citizens who are actively engaged in their communities, and we believe that local journalistic investigation is one of the best ways to promote this kind of democratic participation,” notes John Collins, founder and Director of Development for Weave News. “This project will help empower ordinary people by giving them the tools to bring to light issues that too often go underreported in their communities.”

In addition to providing support and mentoring to project participants, the SLCJI team will work with participants to identify opportunities for publishing their work via the Weave News, NCPR, The Hill News, and Nature Up North platforms as well as other regional outlets.

Created with initial funding from a St. Lawrence University Innovation Grant, the St. Lawrence Citizen Journalism Incubator (SLCJI) is a unique collaboration among four local media and citizen journalism organizations that bring a range of professional, citizen journalism, and citizen science experience to the project: Weave News, The Hill News, North Country Public Radio, and Nature Up North.

About Weave News

Weave News was founded as a global community of citizen journalists committed to weaving a better world. Our organization is directed by a team of seasoned staffers who assist contributors in sharing their work via our investigative blogs, Big Questions videography, multimedia projects, and other initiatives. We believe that the work of journalism is too important to be left solely to establishment and corporate media outlets whose content is increasingly driven by the interests of powerful elites. Our work is grounded in citizen journalism: the idea that any of us can act as journalists by gathering and sharing information about what is happening in the world.

To learn more, visit WeaveNews.org and find us on Facebook and Twitter @WeaveNews.

About North Country Public Radio

Based in Canton, NY, in St. Lawrence County, NCPR operates a network of 33 transmitters broadcasting to the entire Adirondack North Country, western Vermont and southeastern Ontario. The commercial-free format includes a wide variety of programs from National Public Radio including All Things Considered, Morning Edition, Fresh Air and more. NCPR’s awards-winning news team can be heard weekdays at 8:00 am with regional news broadcasts, features and interviews. The station also airs an eclectic mix of locally-hosted music programs.

About The Hill News

The Hill News is a weekly newspaper published by students of St. Lawrence University. It has more than 100-year tradition of publishing news and opinion relevant to the local student but also off-campus community. It is published during academic year and it is financed by Thelmo – the governing entity of the St. Lawrence University’s student body. The newspaper is distributed free on campus. In the past three years, it won several awards in Better Newspaper Contest organized by the New York Press Association, including the first prize for general excellence in the college newspaper category.