OpenNews

Join the DEI Coalition Slack

DEI Coalition For Anti-Racist, Equitable, And Just Newsrooms

Membership in the DEI Coalition is free, and if you meet the membership criteria below, we'd love for you to join! Just fill out our membership request form at the bottom of this page.

Want to learn more about what the DEI Coalition is? Get more information here.

General Membership Criteria

  • You identify as a journalist, work in the journalism industry, and/or work in a space that directly supports journalism.
  • You are committed to fighting for a future where all journalists can work in newsrooms that are anti-racist, equitable, and just, and where the communities journalism has long harmed and/or ignored can trust in journalism again, or for the first time ever.
  • You are who you say you are (our membership request process includes verification).

This is likely not the place for you if:

  • Journalism organizations probably think of you primarily as a vendor, for services such as technology or marketing.
  • You do not believe in racism, systemic bias or oppression, and/or the concept of privilege, and often challenge or shut down conversations when these topics come up.
  • You’re mostly seeking out a therapeutic experience.
  • You are hoping to exclusively host your organization’s union in this space.

Which private channels should I apply for?

In your membership request form, you’ll have the option to apply to join private staff-only channels, private manager-only channels, or choose to apply for neither, and by default join our Coalition-wide public channels.

These private channels are only open to folks who currently identify as having one of the two types of roles — staff or manager — in the journalism industry, and exist to help create space for them to share their ideas and struggles with others in similar situations in their organizations.

If you would like to join staff-only or manager-only channels, our next section has example criteria that could help you decide which space is right for you. These criteria should help you decide which private channels you should apply to enter, but if neither selection seems to fit, that’s okay — you might be best suited for access to coalition-wide channels only. If your job changes later and changing your private channel access would make sense, volunteer moderators can help you make that change. No one will be allowed to join both staff-only and manager-only channels.

Some additional guidance:

  • Folks who were laid off or are unemployed should look at the specific-to-space criteria/considerations based on your last role.
  • Foundation officers committed to DEI work in journalism should select neither.
  • For those in education: fully tenured professors or adjunct professors in leadership roles should select manager-only, and students should select staff-only. Journalists who are adjunct professors in non-leadership roles, and have a different primary job should base their request off of their primary job instead.

You may want to choose access to staff-only or manager-only channels if:

Access to Additional Private Channels

STAFF-ONLY channels
  • People at your organization would not consider you a manager
  • You do not have direct reports
  • You primarily work for news organizations as a freelancer or contractor creating content, products, or news reports
  • You do not have hiring/firing power
  • You are an intern or fellow
  • You are a current student
  • You’ve left a management role and are not seeking another management role
Main conversations
in these channels:
  • How to do diversity, inclusion, equity and belonging work — as a staff person
  • How to start or work in diversity committees, employee resource groups, and/or unions
  • Best ways to convince others at your workplace (peers and managers) to contribute to this work
  • How can we better afford to do this work, in terms of compensation and time
MANAGER-ONLY channels
  • People at your organization would consider you a manager
  • You have hiring/firing power; say over employee salaries
  • You have one or more direct reports
  • You primarily work for news organizations as a contractor in the capacity of helping make strategic decisions that could include hiring or firing
  • You’re required to participate in manager training
  • You have budget oversight
  • You write performance evaluations
  • You could get legally fired for participating in formal labor organizing
  • Your job duties include enforcing company policy toward employees
  • You are a professor or higher-ed instructor
  • You left your previous role and are actively seeking management roles
Main conversations
in these channels:
  • How to coach my team through implementation of DEI changes
  • How to apply a DEI lens to business/fiscal practices
  • Work on retention, promotion, and development
  • Recruit a diverse newsroom and/or freelancers
  • Best ways to convince others at your workplace (your managers, peers, and other staff) to contribute to this work

Membership Request Form

Before filling out your membership request form below, please make sure that you’ve reviewed:

We’ll be asking you to agree to both, so checking them out now will save you time.

Question Preview

Here are the questions we’ll be asking you to answer in the form below:

  • What’s your name?
  • What email address would you like your Slack invite to go to?
  • How can we verify you are who you say are? (You’ll be given a series of concrete options for how to do this, and will provide us with a link to the verification option of your choice.)
  • This community Slack will include channels for everyone, as well as private channels just for Coalition members in staff and management roles. Do you think you’d be a better fit for the staff or management private channels (or neither)?
  • Tell us a little about why it’d make sense for you to join staff-only channels, manager-only channels, or neither?
  • Please describe your work and how it relates to journalism. Where do you work and what type of work do you do there? (This doesn’t just have to be your day job, either.) (Optional)
  • What interests you about this community?
  • How do you approach uncomfortable and challenging conversations, such as when receiving feedback that your words or actions may have hurt another person? (Optional)
  • Meeting our membership criteria is required to receive an invitation, and our Community Agreements represent the commitments you are making to other members of the Coalition when you join. Please read each of the following statements and check each box if you agree. (All statements are from our Membership Criteria and Community Agreements, which are linked above.)

What we’re looking for

As we read your answers, we’re looking to see that you are genuinely invested in this work and committed to taking action to make journalism an anti-racist, equitable, and just industry. There are specific questions to help you share this with us; do so in whatever way feels most natural to you. Your answers don’t have to be long, but they need to give us a real sense of why you’re interested in joining. We may reach out and ask you to fill out the form again if we can’t get a sense of your interest from your answers.