Creating A Diverse Newsroom

 Bennett Snyder

bs381219@ohio.edu

    Diversity is a topic that more than just journalists are adapting to as time moves on. As a white male, I fall under what most consider to be the most privileged combination of race and gender when it comes to the job industry. Due to this fact, I know I have to become as educated on this topic as I can be. Still, lack of diversity is something that more than just the newsroom is facing. 

    Reading is almost always the best way to learn. Thanks to Dawn Taylor, I am now working to train my brain to see beyond stereotypes. She writes about how the most important step in that training is to see people of color has individuals, not as types. She knows this is something that people have struggled with for a while, but in order to become part of the solution, it is a necessary step forward. 

    

Source: S&C Electric Company

   

    The first clear benefit to creating a more diverse newsroom is that there can be many different angles of viewing a story. As a mentioned about demographics earlier, you never want people who all come from the same background working together to cover a story. If that's the case, that newsroom probably rarely has differing opinions. Differing opinions are a good thing at times, especially when those differing opinions work together to hold each and every person accountable. 

    
    In a newsroom, having the ability to assign stories or pieces to journalists that come from different backgrounds, and are different races, are just a few of the benefits of creating a diverse newsroom. A great example of what can happen when a newsroom isn't diverse as it should be comes from an article written by Jelani Cobb.  Cobb goes on to explain how a white journalist failed miserably to see the story from the main subject's point of view. The main point being the value of money for one community compared to the other and how far money goes for each. 

    The reason many publishers are looking to diversify their newsroom is simple: It all comes down to preparation. Nobody ever has a grasp on what breaking news is going to come next, it is impossible to predict the future. Creating a diverse newsroom gives you options. Having options, most likely, leads to giving the person most qualified for the job the assignment. And when the person most qualified person gets the assignment, that is when we as a country get the most reliable news possible.