Impact Is the Most Important Metric
I received a nice, unexpected email the other day.
The subject was “Quick anecdote.”
I just wanted to share that one of our new after school students, who came to us after participating in this year’s summer camp, asked on his first day if we were going to have journalism class! He was quite disappointed to learn that it was just for summer camp.:-)
You had an impact this summer!
The email was from Ginger Graham, the executive director of Centro Guadalupano, an education and human services nonprofit serving Spanish-speaking immigrant families and refugees from East African and Asian countries in the Phillips community of Minneapolis.
In July, our Youth Community Journalism Institute at the Strong Mind Strong Body Foundation taught a journalism class with 2nd-6th grade students at a summer camp at Centro Guadalupano.
The journalism class was one week and four days of classes with English- and Spanish-speaking students. In that time, three groups of students (second and third graders, fourth and fifth graders, and sixth graders) all created a print community newspaper.
Each student wrote a story for their group’s paper, and every student, from the youngest to the oldest, learned the power of community-centered journalism.
We documented the summer camp at Centro Guadalupano with our youth community journalism microinternship program, which we ran in collaboration with Conversaciones de Salud at Carmen Robles and Associates LLC at SPEAK MPLS, a community media center in Minneapolis.
This is the power of youth putting community-centered journalism into action.
We created another community newspaper with youth and the community at the East Phillips Urban Farm — Harvest Moon Block Party: Celebrating Community Solutions festival on Sept. 21 at Cedar Field Park in the East Phillips neighborhood of Minneapolis.
On Oct. 19, we created another community newspaper at another community event, the annual Phillips Clean Sweep.
This community event follows our Oct. 4 “Youth Community Journalism” show on how we make public health better. It was the third episode of “Youth Community Journalism,” a monthly youth-led show that focuses on solutions for local issues. This program featured an emergency room doctor and community leaders.
*Dr. Dziwe Ntaba, emergency room doctor at Fairview Health Services, assistant professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of Minnesota, and co-director of community education and engagement at the Masonic Institute for the Developing Brain.
*Cassie Holmes, Indian Health Board of Minneapolis, Inc., East Phillips Neighborhood Institute (EPNI) board member, Little Earth community leader
*Tommy McBrayer, founder and CEO of Don’t Shoot Guns Shoot Hoops
Our youth community journalism team led the conversation and production of the show. The program’s host was Christian Flores, a 14-year-old ninth grader at South High School in Minneapolis. Co-host and technical director was Cal Ortiz, a 9-year-old fourth grader at Risen Christ Catholic School.
It was a powerful show.
The show is part of our mission at the Youth Community Journalism Institute to strengthen communities through community journalism. We believe youth community journalism programs can create community solutions through community journalism and build a healthy media ecosystem that works for everyone.
The Strong Mind Strong Body Foundation started the Youth Community Journalism Institute in March 2024 to make journalism more accessible to all communities. We provide programming for K-12 students to boost literacy, increase media literacy, and spark civic engagement. Our Youth Community Journalism Institute gives people the training, tools, resources, and support they need to make their communities more powerful.
We do this by creating community journalism programs in schools and youth-centered organizations. These programs use community journalism to create change and make an impact.
The first step is creating an online newspaper for school or youth-focused community organizations. A digital newspaper gives youth and their community (students, teachers, parents, neighbors, school, organization) a platform to share stories and empower voices.
Our latest school has at least 25 interested students.
Increasing Access to Journalism Opportunities
We are not alone in giving more students journalism opportunities.
In New York City, there is an initiative called Journalism for All, led by The Bell, a nonprofit that equips students with the tools to tell impactful stories and thrive in media careers. The Journalism for All program is a collaboration with the NYC Youth Journalism Coalition (run by The Bell), the New York City Council, and Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.
The program aims to get school newspapers in every public high school in the city. Today, New York City has 533 public high schools, but just 27 percent of NYC public high schools (roughly 144) have a student newspaper. That number was about 50 percent in 2009.
“Journalism for All, a $3 million initiative funded by the City Council and private donors, is expected to quadruple the number of Black and Latino students in journalism classes at New York City schools, according to Taylor McGraw, the executive director of The Bell, which created the coalition.”
In December 2023, a story was published in The Pacer, the student newspaper for Pace High School. The story was about the school’s aging gym and water damage from heavy rains at the start of the school year. The article helped the school get $750,000 from the City Council for the gym’s renovation, after months of unanswered pleas from the school to the City Council.
This is the power of student journalism.
The momentum continued with a day of action at New York City Hall in April and continues to build.
Other states such as California, Illinois, Texas, and Missouri have developed journalism programs to help teachers and community leaders prepare aspiring young journalists.
Journalism for All can create justice for all.
It all starts with access.
According to the most recent data from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), there are approximately 130,930 K-12 schools (public and private) in the United States, including 24,000 public high schools. They have approximately 50.8 million students, including about 49.4 million public school students.
While there currently is no official national data tracking on the number of high school news outlets, a 2011 study by Kent State University‘s Center for Scholastic Journalism found that there were more than 11,000 public high schools with student newspapers. That means about 45 percent of public high schools had journalism programs. That number has declined in high schools across the country, and it’s even lower for middle schools.
The schools with the least journalism access to opportunities are underserved communities with students of color, immigrants, and rural populations.
“It’s mostly White, White, affluent,” said Tom Hutchinson, the co-founder of Student Newspapers Online (SNO) Sites, which launched in 2008 and is one of the most popular online publishing solutions for scholastic news programs with over 3,000 sites in their community. “Yeah. I mean, again, in terms of what we visually see at the trade shows, it is overwhelmingly White, 70, 80 percent White.”
The demographic numbers in student journalism are reflective of the state of professional journalism, where 76 percent of journalists are White, according to Pew Research Center.
We have an opportunity to diversify journalism and serve all communities. By creating more journalism programs in K-12 schools across the United States, we can provide more access to opportunities for underserved communities. More students can make an impact.
Global Change Starts in Local Communities
Impact is the most important metric. It reflects real-world outcomes and changes that result from the efforts of an individual or an organization.
Unlike output-based metrics, such as the number of tasks completed or products delivered, impact measures the effectiveness and significance of those actions. It helps determine whether an organization is achieving its mission, addressing the needs of its community, or creating meaningful social, economic, or environmental development.
For example, an educational program might track how many students enroll, but the true impact is seen in how those students’ learning outcomes improve.
Impact shows whether an organization is truly making a difference, justifying its strategies, resources, and goals. By focusing on impact, organizations ensure they are not just doing work, but doing work that matters and drives positive change.
For journalism, prioritizing impact doesn’t just make moral sense. There’s a business case for impact as well.
Focusing on impact creates a cycle of trust, loyalty, and growth that enhances the bottom line while making a positive difference. This holistic approach is key to sustainable business success for any media organization in today’s market.
It’s not too late to make an impact.
