Online Community Building and Health: A Program for Bloggers and Online News Editors

USC Annenberg’s California Endowment Health Journalism Fellowships is launching a new program in 2011 to educate bloggers and editors of online news sites on ways to chronicle the health of their communities. At the same time, the program will help participants improve the “health” and sustainability of their own websites, with strategic and technical advice provided through a partnership with the Renaissance Journalism Center at San Francisco State. This program is co-sponsored by the Online News Association.  

Our program defines health broadly. Factors as diverse as environmental hazards, educational attainment, social capital, low crime rates, and a functioning urban infrastructure (good public transit, garbage collection, clean water) all contribute to the health of communities and the quality of life of residents.

The Annenberg School will select 10 Fellows to participate in the program through a competitive process. Each Fellow will receive $2,000 to support the completion of an ambitious community health news or storytelling project. Once a Fellow is selected, USC Annenberg covers all program expenses. The program will provide participants with new insights, storytelling approaches, and tools for chronicling the life and the health of communities; new strategies for building and engaging diverse audiences; and proven approaches for involving community contributors.  

Fellows are required to attend both program seminars. (The second session is scheduled for June 23-25, 2011.) The Fellowship brings together experts to help Fellows tackle topics in community health, such as environmental issues of concern to neighborhoods; the quality and location of civic infrastructure (for instance, healthy food vendors, child care centers, public transit routes, and safe routes to school); and the quality of local health care. We also will provide briefings that will help Fellows use census and other data to write authoritatively about the unique populations in their communities. The training sessions will combine hands-on workshops with moderated discussions and opportunities for informal discussions in which the Fellows can learn from each other.

Because all blogs and websites have unique characteristics and because each founder has his or her own vision, the program will provide individualized coaching and technical assistance over  six months. The coaching will be provided by Susan Mernit, founder of OaklandLocal.com, and Staci Baird, a SF State lecturer and former multimedia journalist and internet marketing manager for Lucasfilm. Their coaching will focus on the Fellowship project and on tools and strategies that Fellows can use to build audience and promote engagement, including using social media for information gathering, crowd sourcing, and stimulating community conversations. In addition, veteran journalists will provide personalized guidance to help fellows complete their community health projects. These services are provided free of charge.