In summer 2022, CatchLight launched its new model for collaborative visual journalism, the CatchLight Local California Visual Desk, to help newsrooms across the state visually deliver local news and stories that aren’t covered by mainstream outlets.
Adding to the program’s original six newsroom partners, CatchLight and Report for America (RFA) are accepting applications for two additional full-time staff visual journalism positions with the following newsrooms in 2023:
El Tecolote (San Francisco, CA)
El Tecolote, the longest running Spanish/English bilingual newspaper in California, began as a project at San Francisco State University in 1970, at a time when Latinos and other people of color were virtually invisible in major newsrooms. The biweekly publication is now a training ground for aspiring journalists, photographers, illustrators and translators in a dedicated effort to support the diversification of the greater media landscape. Learn more »
El Tímpano (Oakland, CA)
El Tímpano launched in 2018 following a community listening project that invited the perspectives of hundreds of Oakland residents. Today, the local-news site collaborates with its community to create empowering two-way channels of information that inform and engage the Bay Area’s Latino and Mayan immigrants. El Tímpano seeks to foster civic engagement and political empowerment while building more inclusive local media. Learn more »
We are accepting applications until 11:59 p.m. Pacific on January 30, 2023. Click below to apply via the Report for America application portal.
WHY DO WE invest in LOCAL VISUAL JOURNALISM?
Because representation matters.
“Images are our most important form of communication today, dominating social platforms and e-commerce sites and having the greatest credibility for audiences. But investments in visual reporting have been declining for decades across the media ecosystem,” says CatchLight CEO Elodie Mailliet Storm.
According to data from the American Society of News Editors (ASNE), visual journalism staff have fallen by 52% in the last 20 years. The CatchLight Local Visual Desk is working to reverse that trend by providing communities across California access to engaging visual information and creating a framework for sustainability and growth in the field.