Rural Media

The rural initiative is designed to help rural-serving media outlets incorporate solutions journalism into their regular coverage.

Participating newsrooms receive professional development from the Solutions Journalism Network and support from one another. Over the course of six to seven months, news teams learn the basics of solutions journalism and how to find solutions stories in board meetings, press releases and the beat coverage they’re already doing. The cohort supports newsrooms in evaluating story ideas, spotting solutions opportunities and writing strong solutions stories on deadline.

The Solutions Journalism Network has collaborated with a dozen newsrooms in two Rural Cohorts and in 2024 Health Equity Initiative.

2024 Rural Cohort

The 2024 Rural Cohort welcomed seven newsrooms into a cohort that launched in May and will conclude in October. They are:

• Appalachian Newspapers (Appalachian News-Express, Floyd County Chronicle, Mingo Messenger)
• Aspen Public Radio – Colorado
• The Boulder Monitor – Montana
• County 10 – Wyoming
• Monadnock Ledger-Transcript – New Hampshire
• Radio Catskill – New York
• WXPR Public Radio – Wisconsin

2023 Rural Cohort

The inaugural Rural Cohort welcomed six print, online and radio newsrooms from the Mountain West to New England. They were:

• The Boulder Monitor – Montana
• Indigenous Media Freedom Alliance - Buffalo’s Fire – North Dakota
• The Concord Monitor  – New Hampshire
• The Keene Sentinel – New Hampshire
• Southern Ute Drum – Colorado
• Wyoming Public Media

These outlets met for seven months to learn the concepts of solutions journalism and how to apply them to their regular work, producing stories for their daily and weekly products. They shared many insights and successes at the end of the cohort, including:

• Publisher/owner and editor support is vital to keeping solutions journalism prioritized as staff changes. (The Boulder Monitor)
• Big issues can (and many times should) be tackled as multiple stories. (Buffalo’s Fire)
• Solutions journalism stories should be labeled so that readers “can understand that this is meant to be something different.” (Concord Monitor)
• Following the cohort, the solutions mindset has permeated our newsroom. (The Keene Sentinel)
• Solutions reporting further developed our team’s journalism skills. (The Southern Ute Drum) 
• Spending seven months focusing on solutions journalism helped our team look for stories in a “different way.” (Wyoming Public Media)

For more information on rural resources, please reach out to Melissa Cassutt, SJN’s rural media manager. If you are interested in training for your newsroom, visit the events page or make a request.