Louisville Public Media is proud to announce that 89.3 WFPL’s The Next Louisville has been selected as one of 11 projects around the country to receive funding from the 2018 Journalism 360 Challenge, a joint initiative of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Google News Initiative and Online News Association.
The challenge supports ideas focused on pressing issues, from technology surveillance to race. The 11 winning projects were selected from more than 400 applications around the world that addressed the question: How might we experiment with immersive storytelling to advance the field of journalism?
“The winning projects focused on advancing new models and techniques in immersive storytelling. They will work to innovate journalism — providing news organizations and reporters with insights into new forms of storytelling and audience engagement techniques that can shine a light on the issues that matter most to communities,” said Paul Cheung, Knight Foundation director for journalism and technology innovation.
WFPL News will receive $10,000 toward adding a Virtual Reality component to the upcoming chapter of The Next Louisville, which will focus on the challenges youth in our community are facing. Results will include the creation of a roadmap for other small- and mid-sized stations to efficiently produce immersive storytelling components within the context of an intensive daily news operation.
"This grant will give us exciting new tools to tell the stories of Louisville's youth, and to bring those stories to all of our listeners," said WFPL News Director Erica Peterson. "Our reporters are so excited to experiment with immersive storytelling during 2019's Next Louisville project."
The Next Louisville project is a collaboration between WFPL News and the Community Foundation of Louisville, exploring issues of consequence to our city and its future. Previous topics of focus have included education, community health, poverty and progress, and race, ethnicity and culture.
“Lifting our community’s most relevant conversations in ways that are innovative, engaging and inclusive has been our goal for this partnership over the past five years,” said Susan A. Barry, Community Foundation of Louisville’s president and CEO. “We celebrate Louisville Public Media and welcome the support of Journalism 360 for our Next Louisville programming.”
Journalism 360 is a global network accelerating the understanding and production of immersive journalism. Since launching in 2017, the program has built a community of more than 5,500 creators and has funded 22 projects.