Collective-based community news - notes from other stations

These are notes from a meeting that just took place the first week of June at the NATIONAL CAMPUS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CONFERENCE 2011 in Halifax NS.

NEWS DEPARTMENT CAUCUS MEETING MINUTES

Partcipants were interested in:
- Developing a functional community news department
- How to get more reporters and more student participation in news

NEWS DEPT STRUCTURE

Based off of the community news departments at CKUT Montreal and CHRY Toronto, here is one model for a collective-based, community news department:

1) Mandate or Mission Statement.

The mandate is a short, series of statements that affirms the priorities of your news department. At the end of the day, what do you want to communicate and how do you want your department to impact the community? For example, this is the CHRY News and Spoken Word Department mandate:

"CHRY's News & Spoken Word Department is here foster a strong community-led movement for more critical, accountable and representative media. Our goal is to prioritize and promote the voices/sounds of local events and groups who challenge and carefully examine the intersecting forms of oppression among our communities and dominant structures of society.

CHRY is a community-based campus station at York University in Toronto. Our mandate is to provide alternative programming, including in-depth spoken word content targetted to specifically underserviced groups within our listening community. Although students play an important role in programming, we also provide access to members of the community at large. CHRY also provides training in radio production to volunteers. CHRY 105.5 FM is an anti-racist, anti-sexist, and anti-homophobic organization."

2) Trainings

Offering trainings on an ongoing basis (monthly, weekly, etc.) on basic skills volunteers need to contribute are key to sustaining a news department. Some skills include: voicing for radio, writing scripts for radio, audio editing with audacity, introduction to community news values, interviewing techniques, how to use a portable recorder, microphone technique, and research skills among others.

CKUT holds twice a year Training Days - a weekend where volunteers hold workshops on extra skills they want to share with other volunteers.

CHRY has a style guide they use for training. Vols get a copy and use it as a manual. It is attached with this email.

3) Regular News Dept Meetings

Another key component is holding regular news department meetings.
Meetings can include:
- editorial / story assignment meeting
- press packet - passing around the press releases/event listings your station has received. vols can sign up to cover stories
- team up - vols can pair up or work in teams on a story. new volunteers can shadow current volunteers to learn
- CKUT plans the content line up for the following week's Off the Hour community news show (mon-fri, 5-6pm)
- regular production/studio time every week to edit audio or work on pieces
- provide snacks, tea/juice, etc. = this brings people together!

4) Volunteer Roles

Collective member
Producer
Correspondent
Coordinator
Researcher
Engineer
Host
Trainers
Special project participant

5) Archiving Audio and Outreach

You can use your station's website for archiving, or make your own blog for free with wordpress.com.
Check these out for ideas: ckutnews.wordpress.com and chrynews.wordpress.com.

Also check out fsrn.org for reporter guidelines/manual.

--
Anabel Khoo
News & Spoken Word Coordinator
CHRY 105.5 FM Community Radio, Toronto
416-736-2100 ext. 33908
chrynews@yorku.ca
www.chry.fm