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title: "Election SOS: Fellowship Applications are Now Open"
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Election SOS Scenario Planning Guide is now available for newsrooms to download and customize. Get ahead of the chaos.

| View in browser We help journalists cover elections. The Election SOS newsletter is a dedicated resource for journalists covering the 2020 election. Here, we update you on our upcoming programming, share our favorite election-related stories, and provide critical resources to help with your coverage as we move closer to November.  Election SOS Fellowship  Election SOS, in collaboration with the American Press Institute, Trusting News, and the Democracy Fund, rolled out a paid fellowship program to help support local newsrooms around the country in their coverage of the 2020 general election.   Our team will pair newsrooms with qualified and trained fellows, journalism students and recent graduates, who will:  Help support newsroom coverage of this historic election with research, community engagement, and tracking data.  Monitor social networks for breaking news, polling, militia activity, and voter suppression. Assist newsrooms with data entry and creating voter guides. Thanks to our generous funders, we will provide fellows with a stipend of $25/hour to work 8 to 30 hours per week. Fellowships can be virtual or, if feasible and safe per public health guidelines, in person.    The deadline to apply to be a fellow or host a fellow as a newsroom is tomorrow - Tuesday Sept. 29 at 11:59 pm EST.  APPLY NOW Scenario Planning Guide Many newsrooms don't have protocols, equipment, or plans for if things get very bad before, during, or after the election. Election SOS has created this downloadable guide for newsrooms to fill out, customize, augment, and use as a strategic plan to prepare. It's broken down into three major sections:  Protecting Staff from Harm  Protecting the Act of Voting Protecting the Results  DOWNLOAD NOW Upcoming workshops We have a busy month ahead! Explore and sign up for our upcoming workshops like "Reporting on Money in Politics Ahead of the 2020 Election" or "Physical Security During Protest and Poll Coverage."   Free and open to your colleagues, too. Spread the word!   Political Season and Journalism: Overview of Threats and Tactics Have you signed up for this upcoming webinar with Dr. Michelle Ferrier? Hurry up and register now for this one-time only free webinar. The content will not be available publicly afterward.  REGISTER NOW Pitch This Our pitch database is here to provide you with fresh story ideas every day! Spread the word and bookmark the page to always have a great idea at your editorial meetings.  MORE STORY IDEAS What we’re reading:    Pelosi begins mustering Democrats for possible House decision on presidency - Politico Speaker Nancy Pelosi started mobilizing Democrats for the possibility that neither candidates will win an outright Electoral College victory. This hasn't happened since 1876, and it would mean that the fate of the presidency would fall onto the House of Representatives. Each state's delegation would get a single vote, and who receives that vote is determined by an internal tally of each lawmaker in the delegation. This means the presidency may not be decided by the party that controls the House itself but by the one that controls more state delegations in the chamber.   In North Carolina, Black voters are more likely to have mail-in ballots rejected - ProPublica According to a new analysis of 2018 mail-in absentee ballot data from the State Board of Elections by ProPublica and WRAL News, ballots mailed by Black voters during the midterms were more than twice as likely as those sent in by white voters to be rejected. This disparity — similar to gaps in other states — raises concerns about the equity of ballot counting and whether systemic racism and voter disenfranchisement may be tainting elections.   Voters With Disabilities Face Barriers in 2020 From COVID-19- Teen Vogue Thus op-ed discusses the importance of vote by mail for voters with a disability as well as threats voters with disabilities face this election to their franchise. Some of the barriers disabled people currently face with the upcoming election are inaccessibility of voting by mail for people with print-related disabilities, inaccessible state websites for voting, physically inaccessible polling places, to name a few.    Plan to Vote? Here’s What You’ll Want to Know - The New York Times An example of a serviceable voter guide.  Reporting resources: Six Story Ideas from An Election Official - Election SOS The run-up to Nov. 3 — and beyond — promises to be chaotic. This piece offers several story ideas you and your newsroom could report on both before and on Election Day. Based on a webinar with Democracy Fund‘s Tammy Patrick.    Early Voting tracker - U.S. Elections Project Real-time early voting tracker with detailed state statistics and analyses. More states being added as state reports become available.   How to Cover Elections: 4 Tips From an Election Administrator - Election SOS The build-up to Election Day brings about a host of processes — after the fact, too.This infographic offers four tips from a former election administrator, Democracy Fund’s Tammy Patrick, on what to look for.    Online Political Ad Spending - Open Secrets.org Helpful tool to track political ad spending, broken down by candidate.   Vote by Design  An immersive, non-partisan, digital learning experience designed to promote more civic engagement, agency and action among all voters, and particularly next gen voters.  New offer on Election SOS Switchboard   Learn how to sell your editorial plans to the business side from our engagement manager Bridget Thoreson!  Bridget, a reporter and an editor with a master’s degree in marketing from Medill, will be available this week to teach you all the marketing secrets! So, if you want to Learn what that business jargon you've heard flying around the boardroom actually means Understand how marketers structure their pitches to the c-suite - and how you can do the same for your journalism Find out what you can borrow from the marketers' toolkit to reach new audiences and deepen your existing ones ASK BRIDGET   What type of training of information do you want Election SOS to cover? Hit up our suggestion box here.  Were you forwarded this email? Subscribe Here Hearken, 233 N Michigan Ave, Suite 1800, Chicago, Illinois 60601, United States Unsubscribe Manage preferences |
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