Civil Teams with the EJC, News Integrity Initiative to Support European Journalism
We’ve got some exciting news to share today.
Civil, along with the News Integrity Initiative and the European Journalism Centre (EJC), today announced the Engaged Journalism Accelerator. It’s a new program focused on supporting sustainable European journalism initiatives.
This is a significant moment for us; it marks our first, formal foray into the European market — and certainly not the last. Civil will contribute €450,000 as part of a larger €1.7 million program that will be overseen by the EJC. This will enable the EJC to offer twice as many grants to promising European newsrooms that are focused on sustainability and reader engagement, and which need of additional funding to get off the ground. The initiative was born out of the EJC’s extensive research into revenue and sustainability trends. It aims to bolster a growing European ecosystem for empowered, independent journalism that has been pioneered by the likes of De Correspondent and The Bureau of Investigative Journalism.
The Engaged Journalism Accelerator will include a €600,000 grant program (€300,000 of which will come from Civil’s grant, plus a matching €300,000 from the EJC) for 10–15 independent European news organizations. These grants will support emerging newsrooms with a commitment to diversity and engaging readers — including those focused on the underserved local journalism market.
The accelerator program will hold two separate rounds of open calls, in October 2018 and February 2019, respectively. Eligible applicants will have already established a viable journalism project with a dedicated commitment to sustainability and community engagement. The Engaged Journalism Accelerator will provide grants to those applicants it deems to best embody those ideals. The program will adhere to the following principles:
- Coach for success
- Capture and share real case studies
- Connect humans, help them tell stories
- Support skills beyond journalism (business, legal, HR, product)
- Responsible grants (not too big, not too small)
- Tie grants to sustainability and business innovation
- Commitment to great user experience for grantees (easy application, clear criteria)
- Encourage experimentation
- Invest in people over projects
- Aid the development of diverse newsrooms and audiences
Grantees Will Have the Option to (Re-) Launch on Civil
Newsrooms accepted into the program will have the option to launch or re-launch on Civil. It will by no means be a requirement: our goal is on supporting a more sustainable ecosystem for European journalism, wherever it comes from. For those newsrooms that do wish to join Civil, we’ll also offer additional grants of CVL tokens and provide on-boarding support.
This partnership has been in the works for a while. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to Adam Thomas at the EJC, Jeff Jarvis at the News Integrity Initiative and the many, many others who made this possible. As our global community has grown, we’ve received many questions about our pre-launch plans for different markets. This is the first in a series of partnerships and First Fleet newsrooms that we’ll announce prior to launch that underscore our commitment to being a truly global network that reflects our larger community from day one.
A formal call for submissions will follow in the coming months. Those that wish to apply for this program can learn more about next steps from the EJC.
To make sure you don’t miss the latest, be sure to sign up for the EJC mailing list as well.
