Open Call on Infrastructure

• Eligibility Criteria
  Eligible applicants for this Open Call on Infrastructure include:
  – U.S.-based journalism support organisations and intermediaries with a proven track record of deep service to local news organisations;
  – News organisations that are working or plan to work collaboratively with other news organisations as part of their grant. Individual newsrooms may apply as lead applicants for a collaborative project with multiple partners that aim to solve a common challenge for the broader field. Collaborations can be at a local, regional or state wide level. For-profit newsrooms or for-profit service providers can be a part of the group, however the lead applicant must be a non-profit organisation;
  – Newsroom collaborations, local/regional collaborations and/or practitioner/university partnerships.
• Type of Funding: Programmatic
• Target Region: United States
• Application Language: English

The Press Forward is seeking applications for its second Open Call on Infrastructure to support shared solutions to the common challenges newsrooms face.

This open call focuses on strengthening the infrastructure of the local news industry, one of Press Forward’s four strategic pillars. Through this initiative, Press Forward is seeking to fund solutions to the common challenges that outlets face in sustainably creating and disseminating local news. They are looking for bold ideas that can impact the sector at large.

Focus Areas

They are particularly seeking scalable, replicable or new ideas that will impact the field and address one of the four following areas:

• Audience: How can newsrooms attract new audiences, and diversify and deepen relationships with existing ones?
• People: How can working in the field become more attractive, diverse, inclusive and sustainable?
• Operations: How can newsrooms share staff or use tools and technology to become more efficient?
• Revenue: How can local news outlets generate more revenue from a wider range of sources?

Funding Information

• They expect to award a total of up to $20 million among 20-30 applicants distributed across the four funding priorities.
• Grant size: $500,000 – $1.5 million over three years

See here to learn more and apply.

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