CPB Gives NPR $1.5 Million Grant For Diversity Reporting Team

Gets Grant

The CORPORATION FOR PUBLIC BROADCASTING has awarded NPR a two-year, $1.5 million grant for a "major journalism initiative to deepen coverage of race, ethnicity and culture."  The diversity program, which involves the formation of a six-journalist team to cover race, ethnicity, and culture issues on multiple platforms, was announced at the UNITY 2012 Convention THURSDAY (8/2).

"This new team and defined area of coverage will empower NPR to cover news and issues across the U.S. more fully, delivering on our promise for NPR to look and sound like America," said NPR President and CEO GARY E. KNELL. "CPB's forward-thinking commitment to diversity challenges public media to do more, and to do better, and we accept that challenge wholeheartedly."

"We want to dive beneath the surface and capture real conversations that people are having about race and ethnicity," said NPR SVP for News MARGARET LOW SMITH. "America is a fascinating and complex place - we want to shed light on that with original and nuanced coverage."

"We are pleased to support NPR's efforts to strengthen public media's capacity to better serve our diverse country on-air, online and in the community. Public media belongs to every citizen, and this free and commercial-free service is more important to Americans than ever," said CPB President and CEO PATRICIA HARRISON.

"At NPR, we're tackling diversity across a large swath of differences that include class, gender, ideology, sexual orientation, faith and, with this effort, race, ethnicity and culture," said KEITH WOODS, NPR's Vice President for Diversity. "With this team, we'll report from the intersections where, as Americans, we meet and diverge. It's a topic that touches all of our lives."

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