Local Live(s) aims to change how journalist’s voices are used to tell stories. Last year, our bicoastal team of alumni partnered with six newsrooms to produce live storytelling events that featured journalists sharing first-person narratives behind their reporting. 75% of attendees (over 10 events) said they were more confident in their understanding of the journalists’ process after a Local Live(s) event and 90% of attendees stayed for the entire 1-hour-virtual production. This year our team aims to scale the impact of these events — humanizing journalists and increasing trust in the reporting process — by shifting to a franchise model that will allow 30 newsrooms across the country to participate. Our partner newsrooms will have access to our playbook from Season 1, one-on-one workshops, and sustained mentorship that will help them establish a live journalism event model. We will also experiment with how to maximize the reach of stories told on our stage by using them as derivative content for videos and podcasts.
The Team
McArdle Hankin, Co-founder/Executive Producer at Back Pocket Media (Stanford 2020); Tay Glass, Senior Producer at Local Live(s) (Columbia 2020); Allie Arnold, Story Production Fellow at Insider Inc. (Columbia 2020); Carissa Quiambao, Journalist at VICE (Columbia 2020); Lauren Peace, Reporter at Mountain State Spotlight (Columbia 2020)