CFAs: Audience Engaged Journalism Grants

This innovative approach places the audience as a direct and active participant in content creation, fostering trust and stronger relationships between media outlets and their communities, ultimately making them more credible and reliable sources of information.

Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) has been involving communities in reporting and supporting media outlets and journalists through grants, training and mentoring. BIRN has also developed a digital tool which enables journalists to gain insights from the community and involve the audience in the reporting process. The tool also enables the analysis of large scale crowdsource information to produce compelling reports.

Audience-engaged journalism aims to amplify voices of underrepresented communities, including women, young people, marginalised groups and ethnic minorities, to share their information. By engaging their communities, media outlets increase trust and credibility and uncover underreported stories that can provoke impact. Ultimately, media outlets are using innovation to create an inclusive media landscape that will foster democracy and free speech in their region and their local communities.

Types of Grants

• Two following types of grants are available under this Call for Applications:
  • Individual Grants for media outlets wishing to cover national/regional/local topics using their own newsroom resources.
  • Cross-border Grants for at least two media outlets interested in investigating cross-border topics in partnership with the other media outlet. The Audience-Engaged Journalism Grants foster a collaborative environment where media outlets can come together to share their proficiency and expertise. By working together media outlets not only enhance their reporting capabilities but also increase their reach and impact.
  • Partnership can be:
    • Pre-established in situations where a media outlet already has a media partner for a cross-border story, they may apply together for a grant of €8,000 to cover expenses for both parties.
    • Teamed up with BIRN’s support in a situation where a media outlet proposes a cross-border story and does not have a pre-established partnership, BIRN can assist in finding a possible match partner for collaboration.
    • Individual story pairing in cases where individual applicants are proposing the similar story or share an interest, BIRN might propose that outlets pair up to complement their expertise and knowledge.

Funding Information 

• The overall indicative amount expected to be distributed under this Call for Applications is up to €36,000. The table summarises grants foreseen to be given:
  • Individual Grants
    • Maximum Amount  per Grant: €4,000
  • Cross-border Grants (two media outlets)
    • Maximum Amount  per Grant: €8,000

Outcomes

• The audience-engaged grants are designed to achieve the following outcomes with project-supported media outlets:
  • Access to digital audience-engaged tool, which will be actively used in project to involve communities in story development
  • Training in engagement journalism and audience-engaged tool usage
  • On-the-job mentoring in audience-engaged story production
  • Production of investigative and engaging stories of local and regional interest that are based on information crowdsourced using digital tool for audience-engagement
  • Support to join forces and collaborate, sharing knowledge and expertise with one another
  • Support to continue using the audience-engaged tool, fostering a sustained culture of community engagement

Eligible Activities

• The types of activities eligible for support will include but are not necessarily be limited to:
  • Producing the content based on information and data obtained via the audience-engaged tool. Grantees will receive individual access to the audience-engaged tool, along with appropriate training and mentoring. Content may comprise news, analysis, investigations, different news formats: audio, text, video or multimedia. As part of the first edition of Media Innovation Europe, media outlets produced a range of audience-engaged stories, some examples of which you can read here:
    • Image-based sexual abuse in Kosovo
    • Mapping illegal landfills in the Balkans
    • Secret hospital registers in Hungary
    • Transgender and non-binary Serbs document job discrimination
  • Promoting content through social media channels of the respective outlets.
  • Promoting engagement journalism and the audience-engaged tool by introducing dedicated sections on the website, additional information in the ‘about’ and ‘contact’ section, banners, and other relevant means.
  • Encouraging citizens to use the audience-engaged tool as a platform to suggest topics, indicate interest in future reporting and participate in various investigations. These activities may be facilitated through social media channels and innovations on the website described above.
  • Collaborating with a mentor to prepare a story for Balkan Insight. The most successful engagement stories will be considered for publication on the Balkan Insight. The BIRN team and mentors will oversee the selection process to ensure the stories align with the project’s objectives and BI’s publishing standards.

Eligible Costs

• Human Resources Costs:
  • Costs of organisation’s staff and experts directly involved in implementing the proposed activities and proportionate to their level of involvement.
• Production / Research / Communication Costs:
  • Costs related to the production of the stories, including communication with stakeholders, research costs, as well as costs of promotion of the stories on social media.
• Travel Costs:
  • Any travel costs needed to produce the story, especially if it’s a cross-border story or story covering citizen’s experiences in some local or more remote areas in the country.

Eligibility Criteria

• In order to apply, applicants must fulfil the following criteria:
  • Demonstrate a commitment to producing high-quality, independent journalism that serves the public interest.
  • Propose a story with an investigative and in-depth angle, impactful for the community:
    • If applying for an individual grant, the proposed story must address an issue relevant to the national/regional/local audience.
    • If applying for a cross-border grant, the proposed story must address an issue relevant to audiences in Balkan and Visegrad countries, and reflect collaborative effort.
  • Express clear intention and means of including underrepresented communities in stories. These communities may include marginalised groups such as minorities, youth, women and other underreported communities.
  • Be a legally registered entity within the country of application on or before 1 January, 2023.
  • Demonstrate a commitment to actively participate in on-the-job mentoring in engagement journalism and the professional use of audience-engagement tools, following the guidance provided by mentors.

For more information, visit Balkan Investigative Reporting Network.