A faltering picture of diversity: minority journalists don’t have to consult industry surveys to know that their representation in the newsroom falls far below parity – Focusing on Diversity in Journalism
Ben Hammer
Catalina Camia remembers how stunned she was when at a banquet for an Asian American community group in the late 1980s, a lawyer she had been speaking with for 15 minutes complimented her on her English and asked how long she had been in the country. After all, she was well known in city government circles as a Dallas Morning News beat reporter whose stories often landed on the front page.
Whether they began working in journalism three years or three decades ago, most minority newspaper editors and reporters can offer firsthand testimony about an atmosphere that was unwelcoming when they entered the profession.
“You’re constantly battling for a sense of who you are and what you can do,” says Camia, now a regional editor who oversees congressional and national security coverage at Gannett News Service. “You’re constantly battling against people who have preconceptions of who you are and perhaps even stereotypes and that’s hard to do.”
Minority journalists don’t have to consult industry surveys to know that their representation in the newsroom falls far below parity, and many say this won’t change until newspapers focus as much on retaining and promoting minority hires as they do on simply bringing them in the front door.
In April, the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) released its annual survey of minority journalists, showing little positive change over the previous year. U.S. newspapers saw an increase of just 40 Black journalists nationwide, or just 0.04 percent, after two years of decline. Minorities held just 12.5 percent of all newspaper jobs, the survey found.
The percentage of minorities in management positions fell from 20 percent to 19 percent, according to the survey. The report also showed that the percentage of minority interns fell in 2003 to 30.6 percent of all interns, down from 31.1 percent last year. Almost 40 percent of responding newspapers said that they had no journalists of color working for them, representing mostly small and midsize papers.
INDUSTRY EFFORTS TO INCREASE RANKS
“Despite the numbers, there is lots and lots of evidence that the industry is trying to accomplish this thing called diversity with honorable speed and urgency,” says Keith Woods, resident expert on diversity issues and coverage of race at the Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla. “But we still wind up with an industry that doesn’t know how to handle it when it gets it, so we’re losing people because of that.”
Woods is the group leader for reporting, writing and editing at Poynter, which offers training and resources to journalists. Its staff also consults with industry groups.
The Freedom Forum, an international foundation committed to free speech and flee press, sponsors several programs whose goal is to increase diversity at American newspapers. Last year it launched its Diversity Institute at Vanderbilt University, offering 17 mid-career professionals three months of training in journalism before placing them in positions at their local sponsoring newspaper (see Black Issues, Aug. 16, 2001).
The Freedom Forum also administers the ASNE/Associated Press Managing Editors Diversity Fellows program, begun in fall 2000. The organization committed $1 million to fund up to 50 minority journalists who agree to work at newspapers with a circulation of 75,000 or less for up to two years in return for a $5,000 stipend every six months. The program’s goal is to enable smaller newspapers to compete for minority journalists despite the low salaries they offer.
“Editors are very, very receptive to programs that the Freedom Forum has because it doesn’t cost them a lot, but when it comes to training programs and spending money on (diversity efforts) … I don’t see newspapers spending a lot,” says Wanda Lloyd, executive director of the Freedom Forum’s Diversity Institute.
But the Freedom Forum’s largest diversity program to date has been the Chips Quinn Scholars program, which since 1991 has given more than 800 minority college students a week of training in journalism, placement at news internships and a $1,000 scholarship. In 2003, 27 scholars participated in the spring and 74 scholars participated in the summer.
The Dow Jones Newspaper Fund (DJNF) is another major facilitator of internships for minorities. Each summer, the fund gives 30 minority college students two weeks of intensive training and then places them at copy editing internships.
The fund also runs a business reporting program for minority college students. Since 1995, about 10 students per year have attended a training seminar at New York University’s department of journalism before starting a business reporting internship at a daily newspaper or financial newswire.
The DJNF also offers grants for programs that encourage minority high school students who are considering careers in journalism, and to high
school newspapers with a concentration of students of color.
The National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) and the Associated Press Sports Editors (APSE) run a Sports Journalism Institute that offers 10 minority college students a week of training and placement at a paid summer internship at a daily newspaper.
In addition, NABJ will bring 55 college students to its upcoming conference in August for a weeklong student development program where they will put together a newspaper, television and radio broadcasts and an online homepage for the convention.
Some major newspaper companies have their own recruitment and training programs to increase their minority ranks. The Knight Ridder Scholars program offers four-year scholarships and a guaranteed summer newspaper internship to as many as a dozen minority high school students each year.
The company also offers minority college graduates a two-year program that includes a year at a small paper and a second year at a larger publication. The company’s goal is to hire them full-time upon completion, says Bryan Monroe, assistant vice president for news at Knight Ridder, and NABJ vice president for print.
The Tribune Company runs a Minority Editorial Training Program (METPRO) with the specific goal of training and hiring minorities that it can place at one of its 11 newspapers. Each year, the company trains 10 prospective copy editors at Newsday and 10 prospective reporters at the Los Angeles Times before placing them at one of its newspapers for a second year of work. About 240 minority journalists have graduated from the program.
RETENTION: STILL A MAJOR CONCERN
The newspaper industry has been losing jobs for many years, leaving fewer openings for everyone. Many professionals say the dot-com phenomenon led many journalists to look outside the industry for higher paying jobs. Also, news organizations have cut costs in all areas during the current economic downturn, including diversity programs.
Some African American editors say advocacy groups that called for increased diversity have fallen silent since much progress was made in the 1980s. Since then, cutbacks have left the remaining staff with more work than ever before, and less time to focus on improving diversity and coverage of race relations.
“There just seems to not be the same kind of push or need for diversity as there was in certain times,” says Lonnie Isabel, Newsday’s assistant managing editor for foreign and national affairs. “None of this happens unless there is agitation.”
Isabel says that today’s affirmative action candidate has to be a “sure thing,” and that editors aren’t as willing as they used to be to rollup their sleeves and train new journalists.
Newspapers need to do more than just hire minorities to accurately reflect what goes on in the communities they cover, minority editors point out.
“You have to be the whole package and be sincere about it,” says Walter Middlebrook, associate editor for recruitment at Newsday, which has one of the country’s most diverse staffs, according to this year’s ASNE survey. “Reporters and editors know that we have to have people of color in our newspaper. It’s just our way of doing business.”
Many experts point to journalism schools as another reason for the faltering diversity picture. Fewer men have been enrolling in journalism programs because of a perception that the industry is low-paying, say journalism school faculty and industry experts. Also, many editors say universities don’t stress the importance of internships early enough.
Journalism programs at HBCUs are often underfunded and as a result, offer poor technical training and don’t have enough staff to advise a daily student newspaper.
Another major complaint is that universities don’t have enough faculty with real-world journalism experience. Editors suggest that schools partner with local media to improve journalism departments and to reach out to minority students within and outside the department interested in pursing the field.
“Usually, people get frustrated and turned off to the business because of the experiences they had in college,” says Gregory Lee, NABJ secretary and deputy high school sports editor at the Washington Post. “In order to ease them in and keep those numbers high I think you really have to go into the schools and upgrade those programs.” Lee focuses his work at the NABJ on young journalists.
A few journalism programs are following the kind of model that diversity proponents support. Wayne State University partnered with local area media executives to fund its Journalism Institute for Minorities, a program that offers $1,000 a semester to as many as 40 students of color. The program’s director acts as a mentor and adviser to the institute’s enrollees, and each summer they attend a retreat focusing on minorities in the media. Also, importantly, all members of the school’s journalism staff are actively involved in journalism.
“In my position here, I could not be on a tenure track position because I do not have a Ph.D.,” says the institute’s director Sandra Combs Birdiett. “But I believe my students are better served because of my 21 years of professional experience and 8 years as a freelancer.”
Florida A&M University is midway through construction of a $20 million building for its school of journalism, media and graphic arts, set to be completed in June 2004. The centerpiece of the new school will be a multi-media newsroom featuring the convergence of print, online, radio and television facilities.
The only problem is that the school is $2.5 million short on funds for the broadcast equipment in the building and was denied $1.5 million in matching funds by the state for other furniture and equipment.
Despite updating its facilities to match the modern day realities of the industry, FAMU will continue to focus on providing a basic journalism education rather than offering a more specialized curriculum, says Dean Robert Ruggles.
While editors say journalism schools need to be reformed, many experts agree that the industry needs to go outside the established pipeline to find minority journalists.
“There are a lot of talented people who have the writing skills and the critical thinking skills and who have the curiosity about the world who aren’t necessarily at journalism schools or big schools,” says Camia, a former Freedom Forum Traveling Diversity Fellow and the 1999-2000 president of the Asian American Journalists Association.
In 2000-2001, the Freedom Forum sent four Traveling Diversity Fellows to visit 210 college campuses with large populations of students of color with the goal of increasing the number of minority journalists entering the profession. The fellows compiled a directory of minority students interested in the profession for the industry to use in its recruiting efforts.
But whether the problem begins or ends at journalism schools or in the newsroom, Black professionals agree that the solution begins with recognizing issues of race and addressing them openly.
“You recognize the dynamic and you acknowledge it and say it out loud to the people you work with,” says the Poynter Institute’s Woods. “Just like the newsroom, the classroom has to become a place where this discussion takes place out in the open rather than after week 13 and before ethics.”
Undergraduate Degrees Granted by Specialization (by percent)
1990 1992 1994
News Editorial 13.2 11.6 14
Broadcast News 7.7 7.9 10.6
Journalism 8.1 9.3 7.9
Total Journalism 29 28.8 32.5
Radio & Television 10.2 10.9 11.8
Advertising 19.5 17.6 16.2
Public Relations 15.1 16.1 14.7
Other 26.2 26.7 24.9
1996 1998 2000
News Editorial 11.1 11.4 7.4
Broadcast News 8.9 9.7 7.7
Journalism 8.1 9.3 8.6
Total Journalism 28.2 30.5 23.7
Radio & Television 12.4 10.5 8.4
Advertising 13.8 12.1 11.8
Public Relations 13.8 15.8 13.7
Other 31.9 31 42.4
SOURCE: ANNUAL SURVEY OF JOURNALISM & MASS COMMUNICATION ENROLLMENTS
Television News Salaries
Average Median Minimum Maximum
News Director $73,800 $64,000 $18,000 $250,000
Assistant News Director 62,300 57,000 19,000 150,000
Managing Editor 56,900 50,000 19,000 200,000
Executive Producer 48,900 47,000 18,000 115,000
Assignment Editor 32,800 30,000 17,000 85,000
News Producer 29,000 27,000 15,000 100,000
News Anchor 69,000 50,000 17,000 1,000,000
Weathercaster 54,000 43,800 16,000 1,000,000
Sports Anchor 50,600 35,000 16,000 1,000,000
News Reporter 32,300 26,000 17,000 300,000
News Writer 32,300 27,500 12,000 90,000
News Assistant 22,000 21,000 8,000 55,000
Sports Reporter 32,000 25,000 15,000 100,000
Photographer 27,600 25,000 8,000 110,000
Tape Editor 26,600 23,000 8,000 80,000
Graphics Specialist 28,700 25,000 13,000 60,000
Internet Specialist 31,900 30,000 10,800 75,000
Radio News Salaries
Average Median Minimum Maximum
News Director $31,400 $30,500 $10,000 $72,000
News Anchor 30,500 27,500 10,000 150,000
News Reporter 22,600 22,000 12,000 45,000
News Producer 29,400 27,500 21,000 42,000
Sports Anchor 28,000 29,500 14,000 50,000
SOURCE: RADIO-TELEVISION NEWS DIRECTORS ASSOCIATION & FOUNDATION
WWW.RTNDA.ORG/RESEARCH/SALARIES02.SHTML
TV Positions by Gender and Race
Male Female White Minority
News Director 74.1% 25.9% 90.8% 9.2%
Asst. News Director 67.4% 32.6% 87.4% 12.6%
Executive Producer 50.4% 49.6% 89.4% 10.6%
Managing Editor 70.3% 29.7% 86.9% 13.1%
Assignment Editor 59.6% 40.4% 78.2% 21.8%
News Producer 35.7% 64.3% 85% 15%
News Anchor 43% 57% 79.1% 20.9%
Weathercaster 80.5% 19.5% 90.9% 9.1%
Sports Anchor 92.6% 7.4% 89.4% 10.6%
News Reporter 41.7% 58.3% 73.8% 26.2%
Sports Reporter 91.9% 8.1% 89.9% 10.1%
News Writer 33% 67% 64.7% 35.3%
Photographer 92.7% 7.3% 82.7% 17.3%
Tape Editor 68.5% 31.5% 74.9% 25.1%
Graphics Specialist 68% 32% 78.6% 21.4%
Internet Specialist 63.3% 36.7% 93.9% 6.1%
News Assistant 36.1% 63.9% 77% 23%
African Hispanic/ Asian American
American Latino American Indian
News Director 2% 5.8% 0.4% 1%
Asst. News Director 6.2% 3.8% 0% 2.6%
Executive Producer 7.4% 2.4% 0% 0.8%
Managing Editor 7.4% 1.9% 3.8% 0%
Assignment Editor 13.2% 6.1% 2.5% 0%
News Producer 7.9% 5% 1.9% 0.2%
News Anchor 12% 5% 3.6% 0.3%
Weathercaster 3.1% 5% 1% 0%
Sports Anchor 6% 3.8% 0.8% 0%
News Reporter 12.3% 7.9% 5.4% 0.6%
Sports Reporter 6.1% 4% 0% 0%
News Writer 14.8% 10.2% 10.3% 0%
Photographer 9.1% 6.7% 1.1% 0.4%
Tape Editor 13.4% 10.2% 1.5% 0%
Graphics Specialist 8% 6.7% 6.7% 0%
Internet Specialist 2% 4.1% 0% 0%
News Assistant 12.5% 7.9% 2.6% 0%
SOURCE: RADIO TELEVISION NEWS DIRECTORS ASSOCIATION AND THE RADIO
TELEVISION NEWS DIRECTORS FOUNDATION
Newspaper vs. Broadcast Newsrooms
Daily Newspapers TV Newsrooms
Minorities Overall 12.07% 20.6%
African Americans 5.29% 9.3%
Hispanics 3.86% 7.7%
Asian Americans 2.36% 3.1%
American Indians 0.56% 0.5%
Women 37.05% 38.6%
Minority Supervisors 9.7% 9.2%
English-Language
TV Newsrooms
Minorities Overall 19.0%
African Americans 9.5%
Hispanics 5.8%
Asian Americans 3.2%
American Indians 0.5%
Women —
Minority Supervisors —
SOURCE: RADIO TELEVISION NEWS DIRECTORS ASSOCIATION AND THE RADIO
TELEVISION NEWS DIRECTORS FOUNDATION WWW.RTNDA.ORG/RESEARCH/WOMIN.SHTML
Broadcast News Work Force
TELEVISION
2002 2001 1994
White 79.4% 75.4% 82.9%
African American 9.3% 9.9% 10.1%
Hispanic 7.7% 10.1% 4.2%
Asian American 3.1% 4.1% 2.2%
American Indian 0.5% 0.6% 0.6%
RADIO
2002 2001 1994
White 92.0% 89.3% 85.3%
African American 4.1% 5.2% 5.7%
Hispanic 2.4% 5.5% 7.5%
Asian American 0.8% <1.0% 0.6%
American Indian 0.7% <1.0% 1.0%
NOTES: IN TELEVISION, MINORITIES DROPPED TO 20.6 PERCENT–BUT THE
NUMBERS ARE GENERALLY IN LINE WITH HISTORICAL TRENDS (OTHER THAN LAST
YEAR’S). WITHOUT HISPANIC STATIONS, THE MINORITY PERCENTAGE FELL FROM
LAST YEAR’S 21.8 PERCENT TO 19 PERCENT THIS YEAR. IN RADIO, AFTER A
SLIGHT UPTICK LAST YEAR, MINORITIES CONTINUED THE GENERAL SLIDE THAT
STARTED WITH THE ELIMINATION OF THE EEO GUIDELINES. NOTE, COLUMN TOTALS
MAY NOT BE 100 DUE TO ROUNDING.
Numbers and Percentage of Minorities
by Race and Job Category, 2003
African American Hispanics
Number Percent Number Percent
Supervisors 587 20% 421 19%
Copy/Layout Editors 494 17% 379 17%
Reporters 1,537 53% 1,055 48%
Photographers 302 10% 357 16%
Totals 2,919 2,212
Asians American Indians
Number Percent Number Percent
Supervisors 226 16% 79 27%
Copy/Layout Editors 293 20% 44 15%
Reporters 666 46% 128 44%
Photographers 250 17% 39 13%
Totals 1,435 289
Minority Journalists as a Percentage of the Professional Work Force of
Newspapers in Eight Circulation Categories
Circulation 1980 1983 1993 1997 1998
Over 500,000 7.2% 9.4% 16.1% 17.3% 17%
250,001 to 500,000 6.4% 7.8% 14.3% 16.2% 16.8%
100,001 to 250,000 6.3% 6% 11.8% 13.1% 13.2%
50,001 to 100,000 5.6% 6.3% 10.3% 11.3% 11%
25,001 to 50,000 4.2% 3.4% 7% 7.1% 7.6%
10,001 to 25,000 3.1% 4.4% 6.5% 7% 6.9%
5,001 to 10,000 2.4% 3.7% 4.9% 5.1% 5.9%
5,000 and Under 2.8% 3.8% 5.2% 4.6% 6.6%
Circulation 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003
Over 500,000 17.3% 18.4% 18.4% 18.5% 18.6%
250,001 to 500,000 17.8% 18.3% 18.3% 18.8% 19.5%
100,001 to 250,000 13.6% 13.6% 14% 14.5% 15%
50,001 to 100,000 10.8% 10.2% 10.2% 10.5% 10.7%
25,001 to 50,000 7.6% 8.1% 7.4% 7.9% 8.5%
10,001 to 25,000 6.5% 6.9% 6% 7.1% 7.4%
5,001 to 10,000 5.6% 5.6% 4.4% 4.8% 5.5%
5,000 and Under 5.7% 6% 6.4% 4.8% 5.7%
Newsroom Retention
Minorities
Year Total Hires Departures Percent
Retention
1993 5,496 553 177 97%
1998 6,269 586 430 93%
2003 6,855 489 201 97%
Whites
Year Total Hires Departures Percent
Retention
1993 48,106 1,738 3,042 94%
1998 48,451 2,146 1,568 97%
2003 47,863 1,786 1,770 96%
Newsroom
Year Total Percent
Minority Minority
1993 53,601 10.25%
1998 54,721 11.46%
2003 547,181 12.53%
SOURCE: WWW.ASNE.ORG
ASNE SURVEY:
Almost 40 percent of responding newspapers responded that they had no journalists of color working for them, representing mostly small and midsize papers.
COPYRIGHT 2003 Cox, Matthews & Associates
COPYRIGHT 2003 Gale Group
