Pew Center is Renewed

The Pew Center for Civic Journalism has been granted $4.65 million for the next three years by the Board of The Pew Charitable Trusts to continue its work as an incubator for innovative ideas that help journalists better engage people in public life.

The funding will enable the six-year-old center to continue supporting newsroom experiments, train journalists and build on lessons learned through September 2002.

“We now know that when you do journalism differently, readers and viewers notice. And that when you give them an opportunity to be involved in local issues, they take it,” said Jan Schaffer, the Center’s executive director. “We also know that when you support innovation, you get new ideas.”

A goal of the Center has been to explore the news media’s role in helping to re-engage people in discussing and solving problems in their community. “We have learned that core journalism values are not a barrier to helping citizens embrace the range of possibilities that keep democracy vital,” Schaffer said.

The renewal comes as the news industry is reaching out for new ways to repair damaged credibility and to remain relevant and useful to readers. Research has shown that civic journalism has improved the public’s attitude towards local news organizations. And, as civic journalists have experimented with new definitions of “news,” they have produced more meaningful news and information.