Apply for a Renewing Democracy grant

Get support for your citizens agenda efforts

February 5, 2020

CHICAGO — Hearken is proud to announce a new partnership with the Solutions Journalism Network that will allow journalists who want to reimagine their elections coverage by combining solutions journalism with a Citizens Agenda approach to apply for a Renewing Democracy grant.

The application deadline is 11:59 p.m. PT on Tuesday, Feb. 25.

The Renewing Democracy initiative from Solutions Journalism Network supports reporting about how people and institutions are attempting to reinvigorate democracy in communities across the country. Over the past two years, 66 newsrooms, with help from the Solutions Journalism Network, dug up stories about what’s working when it comes to our elections and civic life, which strengthened and complemented equally important stories about what’s wrong.

For this latest round of grants, we’re looking for newsrooms that want to ensure the most pressing issues in people’s lives get covered in a way that illuminates where progress might be possible.  You’d start by listening more deeply to what your communities want candidates (and your political coverage) to address. Then you’d cover those issues in-depth, with traditional enterprise reporting and solutions journalism.   You might focus your questions to candidates based on what you find, for example, like the Richland Source has done.  And, for the solutions journalism part, vet candidates’ ideas for addressing those issues and/or look for other promising practices that might also work in your community. If your reporters keep hearing that people want to know more about how this whole “free college” thing would work, for example, you might report on places where it is raising the rate of college attendance.  

Hearken and SJN are joining forces because we recognize stories built from community input often work well paired with solutions journalism, a combination not unlike peanut butter and jelly.   We know there’s interest out there because the Solutions Journalism Network already is supporting two newsrooms with efforts like this underway and more than 300 people have downloaded the Citizens Agenda guide.

How it works

Grantees will get support from SJN, Hearken and each other, starting with a kickoff training event in Chicago in April. The deadline for applying is Feb. 25. Just so this doesn’t get lost: We still will be accepting traditional Renewing Democracy pitches, too. So please apply if you have ideas for solutions stories, but don’t want to dive into the Citizens Agenda approach. Conversely, Hearken is interested in talking with newsrooms that want to do the Citizens Agenda approach without solutions journalism.

Another important note: To participate in the Citizens Agenda/Solutions mashup, you don’t have to buy a Hearken package. You just need to use the Citizens Agenda approach in some form with solutions journalism as part of it.

And a few basics:

• Most Renewing Democracy grants are up to $4,000, although can be bigger if the proposal is ambitious enough.

• The grants can cover travel, engagement (including part of the cost of Hearken package) and … just about anything but salary.

• We’re not able to accommodate non-US-based newsrooms for this grant

Have questions? Want to brainstorm what your project might look like? Get in touch. Send an email to Linda Shaw at SJN, or Bridget Thoreson at Hearken.

We look forward to working with you to build exciting election coverage that’s valuable to the communities you serve.