Announcing Election SOS 2022
Primaries and the midterms are upon us! What if newsrooms could do their election coverage better?
That question was the foundation of the Hearken-led 2020 Election SOS initiative, a program that provided training, resources and financial support to newsrooms covering the most turbulent election in recent US history.
Hearken worked with hundreds of journalists from newsrooms of all types across the country through Elections SOS and other elections-focused programs to strengthen their election reporting and center the critical information needs of their audience.
Newsrooms that participated in 2020 say Elections SOS helped them:
- Reach underserved communities
- Build trust with their audience
- Create original, differentiated content
- Replace traditional horse-race coverage with reporting that directly addressed voters’ policy questions
Get trained for 2022
Back by popular demand, Election SOS is offering the Engaged Elections cohort training. Thanks to generous grant funding from Democracy Fund and The MacArthur Foundation, we’re able to subsidize a limited number of newsrooms.
When
- Monthly cohorts in June & July 2022
- Each cohort runs over the course of 4 weeks with a 90-minute workshop held weekly on Wednesdays from 2:30–4pm EST, with light assignments in between
What
Engaged Elections cohort participants will develop a winning strategy to surface and respond to their public’s critical information needs related to newsrooms’ election(s) of choice.
By the completion of the Engaged Elections cohort, active participants will:
- Learn a variety of alternative strategies including The Citizens Agenda approach
- Define their mission & corresponding metrics for their elections coverage in 2022
- Develop practices for reaching beyond newsrooms’ immediate audiences
- Identify audience information needs critical to the newsrooms’ election(s) of choice
If your newsroom is looking to improve its elections coverage in 2022, visit the Election SOS website and fill out this form to learn more and see if you qualify for the month-long training program. Entry into our June cohort is by May 15, and entry into our July cohort is by June 24.
Election SOS is a fiscally sponsored project of the American Press Institute and led by Hearken.
About Election SOS
“Election SOS helped us reassess how our election coverage impacts the communities we serve. Plus, the opportunity to workshop and share information and best practices with other news organizations has been invaluable.”
– Carlos Virgen / Digital News Director, The Day
Election SOS’s month-long program helps newsrooms center their coverage on voters rather than politicians. Hearken provides participating newsrooms with training and support to help newsrooms launch successful strategies that are proven to build trust, generate original stories and better serve the public.
Elections SOS participants expressed a desire to “do something different” than their previous coverage. They wanted their new approach to covering elections help them reach new audiences, have a meaningful impact, and meet the key business goals of their organizations.
In 2020, training proved enormously successful in helping participating newsrooms prepare for the election.Of the newsrooms who participated in Hearken’s training for the 2020 elections cycle,
- 84% said participating built trust between their newsroom and their community members
- 89% said participating helped them be more able to listen and respond to their communities
- 78% said participating increased the size of their audience
- 100% said they would use the engagement strategies they learned in the next election
From: Robinson, Sue. (Forthcoming). How Journalists Engage: A theory of trust-building for a multicultural world. Oxford University Press
If your newsroom is looking to improve its elections coverage in 2022, visit the Election SOS website and fill out this form. We’ll be in touch!
