• Investing in BIPOC-led and BIPOC-serving organizations with sustained and unrestricted funding. Funders’ decisions about who to fund and how to fund speak to important questions about how philanthropic wealth is allocated across the sector and what funders should (or should not) do to help address inequities, both within the sector and in the communities that news outlets serve. This report’s findings suggest the need to continue deepening philanthropy’s support for BIPOC-led and BIPOC-serving outlets. This support needs to reflect an understanding and recognition of power and trust, including the intentional shifting of power in relation to historical patterns of inequity. For example, unrestricted grants help shift power to outlets, recognizing that they are best positioned to determine how to use the funds for purposes of serving their communities and sustaining their work. INN and other field-building organizations can support this work – for example by helping to educate funders about these outlets, expanding the pool of funders engaged in supporting journalism that is created by and for BIPOC and other underserved communities, and tracking funding patterns over time.
• Supporting pathways to greater racial and ethnic diversity, especially at leadership levels. There are multiple pathways here. For example, one pathway is to create opportunities for BIPOC professionals — from those who are early in their careers to those in management positions — to access the support they need to advance professionally or achieve their organizational goals. This includes cohort-based programming that INN and other field-building organizations offer. Another pathway involves resourcing and building capacity to increase diversity within news organizations, through efforts like recruitment and expansion of their leadership team. Some of this work falls on news outlets, particularly those who know their staff and leadership do not reflect the diversity of the communities they serve. But this needs to be in partnership with funders who enable news organizations to set meaningful diversity goals, resource their efforts and evaluate what’s working (or not) to advance those goals.
• Accelerating the adoption of DEI practices among news outlets of all sizes. News outlets are at the center of this work. They are the ones who are tasked with setting goals, resourcing and implementing efforts, and ensuring those efforts yield the intended results. But they need the support of funders, who can do more to help outlets (particularly smaller ones) allocate money and staff time toward dedicated and sustained DEI efforts. News outlets can also benefit from field-building organizations that offer access to DEI resources and programming, particularly those that reflect a nuanced understanding of the different needs of different types of outlets. More broadly, this report’s findings confirm that DEI efforts need to be guided by a clear sense of the “why” and a commitment to getting the “how” right. DEI is not simply an end in itself – it is in service to broader goals around advancing racial, gender, and social justice and helping diverse communities thrive. Attention should be paid to whether and how DEI practices have enabled a news outlet to contribute towards those goals, not just whether the outlet has implemented certain practices.

Looking ahead, INN will continue to reflect on the DEI findings and their implications for INN’s work in supporting the sector —doing so in conversation with member news organizations, funders and partners.

There are signs of promising, incremental progress in the sector, but sustaining forward momentum is not a given. In this moment, when the focus on DEI could either endure or fade, there’s an opportunity to double-down on efforts to create a sector that fully reflects and serves all communities.