To submit an application or for further information, go to www.informationneeds.org. Non-foundation community partners may participate, but they must partner with a qualifying community or place-based foundation. The application deadline is February 27, 2012.

Knight Foundation program directors will host a Web-based live chat at noon EST on February 8, 2012, to answer queries from foundations. The live chat will take place at www.informationneeds.org.

Susan Patterson, Knight’s community director in Charlotte, North Carolina, writes about the challenge, including past winners, on the Knight Blog.

Foundation leaders who want to learn more about supporting media and information environments in their own communities can attend the Knight Foundation’s fourth annual Media Learning Seminar, February 20-21, 2012, in Miami. Registration is open until February 1st.

The Community Information Challenge is one more way that the Knight Foundation is supporting the information needs of communities.

Related posts:

1. Knight, Local Foundations Partner on Community Information Needs
2. National Contest to Fund Local Information Experiments
3. News Leadership 3.0 — LIVEBLOG Mar 1-2: Community foundations, media/tech experts explore local info needs

As the Harrington School’s founding director, Hobbs says her goal is to create “a school of national distinction” that emphasizes digital and media literacy, a global perspective on media and communication, and innovative teaching and learning. The school brings together previously separate programs in communication, journalism, public relations, and film/media with writing and rhetoric and library and information studies.

The Providence Journal published an op-ed by Hobbs the day before she formally assumed her new position, (“Folks need help with information overload,” December 31, 2011 print edition, B7; searchable in ProJo’s eEdition Back Issues). The article raises several key issues relative to digital media and education that suggest the need to think differently, and more broadly, about the interplay of technical, analytical and social skills that are at the core of digital literacy. Citing the findings of the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy, Hobbs makes a strong case for prioritizing investments in community-based programs and educational curricula that teach the digital and media literacy skills required to thrive in the digital age.

“The Internet is quickly becoming the critical gateway for accessing jobs, education, healthcare, government services and civic participation, yet a disturbing number of Americans lack broadband access or the basic skills in how to use it,” noted Hobbs. “But digital literacy is not as simple as giving people access to a broadband hookup. As the nonpartisan Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy found, digital literacy is actually a constellation of life skills that are necessary for full participation in our media-saturated, information-rich society.”

What are these life skills that are encompassed by digital literacy? They include the abilities to access, analyze and evaluate, create, reflect and act. In her ProJo op-ed, Hobbs lists the following capabilities:

• the ability to analyze messages in a variety of forms, including identification of the author, purpose and point of view of the message;
• the ability to evaluate the quality and credibility of content in a message (e.g., distinguishing between “a marketing ploy for nutritional supplements and solid information based on scientific evidence” or quality content and junk journalism);
• the knowledge of and ability to use powerful search strategies;
• the development of multimedia creation skills;
• the ability to use the Internet to connect with others with shared interests;the ability to reflect on one’s own online conduct and one’s online social responsibilities;
• the ability to use the power of communication as a tool for advocacy;
• an understanding of copyright;
• the ability to apply social responsibility and ethical principles to communication behavior;
• the ability to work collaboratively to solve problems in the civic sphere, which will require many of the other capabilities listed above.

Hobbs envisions a “community education movement” that is embraced by all stakeholders in the community:

What is needed now is a clear and compelling vision of the specific types of instructional practices that can best support the development of these new competencies among all Americans. We need programs to help bring these new forms of learning to educators at all levels. We all have skin in the game when it comes to the vitality of our communities, which is why digital and media literacy needs to be a community education movement, embraced by all stakeholders.

To learn more about the essential competencies of digital and media literacy, and steps that communities can take to strengthen digital citizenship and make digital and media education part of mainstream education in the United States, see Hobbs’ white paper, Digital and Media Literacy: A Plan of Action, published by The Aspen Institute Communication and Society Program.

Related posts:

1. Digital and Media Literacy: A Plan of Action
2. It’s Time for a National Commitment to Digital Literacy
3. Media Literacy Starts with Everyone, Report Says

Adam Thierer

Adam Thierer’s most recent op-ed (“Thinking about the Future of Informed Communities and Journalism”) in his Technologies of Freedom column on Forbes.com is worthy of note– and not just because it mentions the work of the Knight Commission and the related series of eight white papers published by the Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program. Adam, who is a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, authored one of these white papers, Creating Local Online Hubs: Three Models for Action, which was released earlier this year.

Incivility and outrage seem to be the fashion for a lot of public discourse these days. As we prepare to enter an important election year, Adam’s essay is especially notable, for two reasons. First, he brings a thoughtful approach to the big questions addressed by the Knight Commission, which are all the more significant as the country prepares for an election of major importance.

• Do we, as citizens, have access to the right sort of information to make informed decisions for our communities and the broader public sphere? And,
• Do we, individually and collectively, have the knowledge, skills and capacity to take action based on that information–action that benefits individuals, families, communities and the state of our deliberative democracy?

Second, his essay reflects the open-minded, democratic spirit and values that the bipartisan group of commissioners — 15 men and women from diverse personal, professional and political backgrounds — adopted as they went about investigating these questions. He recognizes that, even though people may differ on the best policies for promoting freedom and prosperity in the Information Age, the big questions are worth asking and discussing and we all benefit from the exploration and experimentation taking place. It’s the same sentiment that Adam brought to his white paper when he wrote,

There is no one-size-fits-all, best approach to designing high-quality local online hubs. A thousand flowers are blooming in today’s information marketplace and that is a wonderful thing. The more experimentation, the better at this point. But we should not assume that a hub model that works well in one community will automatically work for another. …Our primary concern should be underserved communities.

It’s easy for those of us who live in areas of relative affluence and information abundance, with a staggering array of information and communication services literally at our fingertips, to forget that there are still millions of Americans who do not have access to the technologies of freedom, or the resources to learn how to use them effectively for personal, commercial or civic benefit. Much of our civic discourse is moving to digital platforms, noisy spaces with new rules of engagement. We cannot sustain a healthy democracy with citizens who are forced into second-class status by an information divide. Adam is correct that the key to creating an informed, engaged citizenry in this new environment is maximizing the opportunities for information to flow and for people to acquire the skills they need to use it effectively.  The white papers offer a selection of specific steps and policies for a path toward a brighter future of informed communities and journalism.

Related posts:

1. FOCAS10: News Cities: The Next Generation of Healthy Informed Communities
2. Mike Fancher: Contemplating the Future of Local Journalism
3. Measuring Informed Communities at the Free Press Summit

Assessing Community Information Needs: A Practical Guide is a guide for adopting civic innovation strategies to spur the development of news and information environments that address real community needs.  Civic leaders, elected officials, motivated citizens, community-based organizations and others can use this guide to understand how to integrate useful practices for assessing and building engaged, informed communities—communities with the civic capacity necessary to deal successfully with today’s many economic, social, environmental and political challenges. (Download PDF or Read Online)

*Watch related Roundtable Discussion*

Author Richard C. Harwood sets forth a set of assessment strategies that go beyond merely counting the information assets that exist in the community. While high-speed broadband, news websites, social media and local online hubs are important for expanding opportunities to participate in public life, in order for these technologies to be truly transformative communities need to create a receptive environment where citizens engage more fully with the spectrum of information and knowledge providers that contribute to the health and stability of a community: schools, businesses, libraries, nonprofits, other organizations and each other.

Harwood proposes a set of nine strategies, governed by four guiding principles, to help people in a community take effective action toward improving their information ecology. The paper also includes a checklist for getting started.

Among the key elements of his nine step plan are the following:

• Engage the community early on and focus on core community needs. Being in the community and hearing people talk about their community can yield valuable insights that lead to refocusing existing efforts, creating new types of content, developing new networks of partners, and building a more useful information infrastructure.

• Actively cultivate boundary-spanning organizations and groups.  Public and commercial media, community foundations, public libraries, and local United Ways are among the groups that bring people together across dividing lines, incubate new ideas and spin them off and reflect the aspirations and concerns of the community. These intermediary organizations should play an essential role in assessing and building healthy information environments.

• Tell the community’s story of change. Told well and over time, such stories can help a community create a “can-do narrative” about its ability to tackle change and invite people to step forward.

• Ensure enough entry points for people to engage. There must be sufficient “on-ramps” for people to participate in the information environment and community life. Technological on-ramps like high-speed broadband are important, but so are a variety of cultural and social access points.

Together, Harwood’s nine strategies and four guideposts will allow communities to focus on building information environments, engaging the community and taking action on what matters most.

This paper is the eighth paper in a series of white papers focused on implementing the 15 recommendations of the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy. The white paper series is published by the Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program in partnership with the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Richard Harwood is the founder of The Harwood Institute for Public Innovation.

Related posts:

1. Roundtable on Assessing Community Information Needs
2. Assessing Community Info Ecosystem and Needs in Southern Vermont
3. Updated: Measuring the Information Health of American Cities

The New York Times has an article on today’s announcement with more details here.

The event will be live streamed at 10:00 Eastern (link here).

Related posts:

1. Digital Literacy Skills Essential to Closing Broadband Gap
2. One Economy’s National Digital Literacy Initiative
3. Personal Stories of Broadband Highlight Digital Inclusion Summit

Leading-edge thinkers in both fields have come together recently in several different venues to explore answers to this question. The early feedback on these discussions is that this is a worthwhile topic to discuss at a critical time for both institutions.

In April, Journalism That Matters convened a ground-breaking “Beyond Books” conversation among journalists and librarians at MIT’s Center for Civic Media. JTM’s Biblionews website is full of ideas for connections to explore, including information on pilot projects that are underway since the gathering at MIT. There is also an inspiring 7-minute video of the conference produced by the very talented Jacob Caggiano that describes what journalists and librarians can do together.

What’s possible when librarians and journalists meet? a video report from the “Beyond Books” event at MIT hosted by journalismthatmatters.org

Bill Densmore and Mike Fancher, who along with Peggy Holman are key leaders directing JTM’s fantastic work on innovating journalism at the local level, brought the discussion to the annual conference of the American Library Association, held in late June in New Orleans.

Mike presented his newly released white paper, Re-imagining Journalism: Local News for a Networked World, as part of a panel discussion on effective partnerships between libraries and journalists that create opportunities for local news and civic engagement. He also outlined how libraries are addressed in several of the other white papers on implementing the broad set of recommendations of the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy, a theme we will explore in future blog posts.  Mike was joined on the panel by Nancy Kranich, founder and leader of ALA’s Center for Public Life and ALA’s civic engagement membership initiative, and Annie Anderson, who heads the LibrariUS initiative at American Public Media. (Due to travel delays, Bill did not make it to New Orleans for the panel.) The two-hour session on “Competing in the Information Marketplace II: Strategic PR partnerships — Journalists and Libraries,” was hosted by the Library Leadership and Management Association.

Mike’s key takeaways from the ALA discussion, summarized on the Biblionews website, include ideas that resonate with the Knight Commission’s Informing Communties report:

Librarians see civic engagement as an important element in what they do and how they make their case for public support. Civic engagement helps democracy, but it also has economic benefits to communities.

Digital literacy is a core competency of libraries. It needs to be actively advanced and promoted.

Institutional inertia could be a barrier in some library systems. Students are being trained for a new library culture, but the needed cultural change may come slowly in some systems. (This is a great topic to explore for libraries and journalism.)

People are excited about early results from LibrariUS, a partnership among the American Public Media Public, the ALA and its Public Library Association division. Attendees offered several ideas and examples for extending it.

Several people spoke glowing about their experience at the Biblionews conference at MIT in April. Two items stood out: 1) the JTM methodology for bringing together people from different backgrounds and disciplines; 2) the use of information technology to capture the experience immediately and permanently. The librarians were particularly interested in the second item.

The library community is ready to move ahead; bringing journalists along may be a tougher challenge. (That’s my view, not the librarians’.)

Higher education needs to be a partner.

Among ideas raised by others in attendance were the possibility of libraries helping to map local news and information ecosystems and new ways to extend the Public Insight Network’s partnership with the ALA and its Public Library Association Division (described in the JTM video).

Related posts:

1. Finding a new model for news reporting
2. Libraries+Local News=Civic Engagement
3. Going on the record: Civic engagement is for journalists, too!

Universal Broadband: Targeting Investments to Deliver Broadband Services to All Americans, Blair Levin, Former Executive Director of the Omnibus Broadband Initiative of the Federal Communications Commission and currently Communications and Society Fellow at the Aspen Institute. The paper analyzes how to diminish second-class digital citizenship by assuring access by all to broadband services. Universal Broadband author Blair Levin rigorously and repeatedly engaged the broadband community and other, more general audiences from Washington, D.C. to Las Vegas, Nevada.  His in-person debates were reported in the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and in the PBS space.

Digital and Media Literacy: A Plan of Action

Rethinking Public Media: More Local, More Inclusive, More Interactive

Government Transparency: Six Strategies for More Open and Participatory Government

Creating Local Online Hubs: Three Models for Action

Civic Engagement and Community Information: Five Strategies to Revive Civic Communication

Re-

Assessing Local Information Needs: A Practical Guide

Related posts:

1. Aspen Institute to Advance Recommendations of the Knight Commission
2. Groups Advancing Knight Commission Recommendations Submit Comments to FCC’s Future of Media Inquiry
3. FOCAS10: News Cities: The Next Generation of Healthy Informed Communities

The formal release will take place during a high-level roundtable discussion among a select group of leaders, innovators, advocates and critics from the national, state and local levels on Friday, June 10, from 12:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. (CST) at The Chicago Club (81 E. Van Buren, Chicago, IL 60605). Following the presentation of the paper, these leaders and experts will debate the best ways to implement the recommendations at a time when citizens are demanding a more participatory society, and as systems for exchanging news and information undergo significant change.

Peter Levine

Featured Speaker:

Peter Levine is director of CIRCLE, The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement, and research director of Tufts University’s Jonathan Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service.

Roundtable participants include:

Lisa Bardwell, President and Chief Executive Officer, Earth Force Incorporated
Susan Benton, President and Chief Executive Officer, Urban Libraries Council
Brian Brady, Executive Director, Mikva Challenge
Lisa Morrison Butler, Executive Director, City Year Chicago
An-Me Chung, Associate Director of Education, MacArthur Foundation
Thom Clark, President, Community Media Workshop
Steven Clift, Founder and Executive Director, E-Democracy.org
David Crowley, President and Founder, Social Capital Inc.
Paula Ellis, Vice President, Strategic Initiatives, John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
Barbara Ferman, Executive Director, University Community Collaborative of Philadelphia
Lew Friedland, Professor, School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin
Christopher Gates, Executive Director, Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement
Robert Hackett, President, The Corella & Bertram F. Bonner Foundation
Don Heider, Dean, School of Communication, Loyola University Chicago
Joseph Hoereth, Director, Institute for Policy and Civic Engagement, University of Illinois at Chicago
Ngoan Le, Vice President of Programs, The Chicago Community Trust
Torey Malatia, President and Chief Executive Officer, Chicago Public Media
Mabel McKinney-Browning, Director, American Bar Association Division for Public Education
Heather Peeler, Chief Strategy Officer, Corporation for National and Community Service
John Sirek, Director, Civics Program, Robert R. McCormick Foundation
Scott Warren, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Generation Citizen
Lauren Young, Program Director, The Spencer Foundation
Constance Yowell, Director of Education, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation

Moderator: Charlie Firestone, Executive Director, Communications and Society Program, The Aspen Institute

*Please note that space is limited to members of the press who RSVP. Please RSVP to erin.silliman@aspeninstitute.org or 202.841.4968.

Related posts:

1. Five Strategies to Revive Civic Communication
2. Roundtable on Assessing Community Information Needs
3. Roundtable on Digital and Media Literacy

Digital and Media Literacy: A Plan for Action, the KnightComm white paper by Renee Hobbs, highlights NAMLE’s work in developing core principles for media literacy education.

More information about the conference is available at www.namle.net/conference.

Related posts:

1. Digital and Media Literacy: A Plan of Action
2. Calls for Greater National Investment in Digital Literacy Grow
3. Roundtable on Digital and Media Literacy

The centerpiece of the initiative is the DigitalLiteracy.gov portal, an online hub for librarians, educators, and other digital literacy practitioners to share content and best practices. It recognizes that Americans cannot compete globally without the skills and understanding to use technology and information effectively.

In a White House blog post accompanying the launch, U.S. Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra and Assistant Secretary and NTIA Director Lawrence Strickling said, “Through DigitalLiteracy.gov, NTIA is making available to all Americans the methods for improving broadband adoption that are being developed by Recovery Act projects.” The Commerce Department’s announcement is available here. NTIA, or the National Telecommunication and Information Administration, is one of two government agencies (the other being USDA’s Rural Utilities Service) responsible for administering the federal Broadband Opportunity Grant Program (BTOP) to achieve the goal of universal broadband penetration and adoption in the United States. (See KnightComm’s earlier posts about the BTOP grants.)

NTIA has posted a nice fact sheet on digital literacy on its website that cites statistics for why digital literacy is important. Among these statistics in the fact sheet are the following:

• Ninety-six percent of working Americans use new communications technologies as part of their daily life.
• Sixty-two percent of working Americans use the Internet as an integral part of their jobs.
• American jobs related to the Internet contributed an estimated $300 billion of economic activity to the U.S. gross domestic product in 2009, according to one estimate.
• Nearly one-third of U.S. households (32 percent) lack broadband service.
• The two most commonly cited reasons for not having broadband Internet access at home are that it is perceived as not needed (46 percent) or too expensive (25  percent).
• There are notable disparities between demographic groups: people with low incomes, disabilities, seniors, minorities, the less-educated, non-family households, and the non-employed tend to lag behind other groups in home broadband use.

These issues, and strategies for advancing digital literacy in all communities regardless of geography or demographics, are addressed in two white papers–Digital and Media Literacy: A Plan of Action by Renee Hobbs and Universal Broadband: Targeting Investments to Deliver Broadband Services to All Americans, by Blair Levin–published recently by the Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Related posts:

1. It’s Time for a National Commitment to Digital Literacy
2. Final BTOP Grants Announced; Total of 233 Projects Share Nearly $4 Billion
3. Calls for Greater National Investment in Digital Literacy Grow

PBS President Paula Kerger at 2011 Hurley Symposium

Hurley Symposium Highlights Public Media Innovations to Connect Communities

Having survived the most serious threat to federal funding in public broadcasting’s 44-year history, the heads of public broadcasting’s leading organizations aren’t quite ready to celebrate.   The 2012 federal budget debate lies ahead and, along with it, the need to continue defending the federal dollars that support the operations of so many local public stations across the country. As if this isn’t enough, public media also face an array of additional challenges, notably the need to raise additional money to invest in building capacity for more serious, in-depth journalism, reach out to new segments of the community and expand to new digital platforms.

The chief executive officers of PBS, NPR, American Public Media and the Association of Public Television Stations came together this week to discuss how they are dealing with these issues as part of the University of Missouri School of Journalism’s Curtis B. Hurley Symposium — “The Future of Public Broadcasting: Innovating to Connect Communities” — at the National Press Club. The aim of the Symposium was to gain a better understanding of the transition that needs to take place for public broadcasting to meet its mission to serve communities. This transition is the subject of Rethinking Public Media: More Local, More Inclusive, More Interactive, a recent white paper by Barbara Cochran, the Curtis B. Hurley Chair in Public Affairs Journalism at the University of Missouri, who moderated the symposium.

Opening the symposium, PBS NewsHour anchor Jim Lehrer called for greater investment in serious journalism across all public media outlets. He also emphasized the need to create new partnerships and collaborations to support high quality journalism, including partnering with commercial outlets. Lehrer’s remarks support the public media recommendation of the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in  Democracy.

Sustaining Support on the Long Road Ahead

The fierce rhetoric surrounding the debate over federal funding for the current fiscal year (FY 2011) gave the appearance that public broadcasting is a partisan issue. Indeed, when the House voted in March on a bill to eliminate federal funding for NPR, members voted along party lines, with only seven Republicans crossing the aisle to join Democrats who overwhelmingly voted against the measure. So, with the Republican-controlled House on record to eliminate federal funding and the President’s own bipartisan budget commission having recommended that funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting be zeroed out, how did funding get restored in the final budget resolution passed by Congress? And what does this mean for the funding battles yet to come?

Public broadcasting clearly enjoys more support across the country than the recent debates and media coverage over the funding battle and the controversies swirling around NPR would suggest. Patrick Butler, CEO of the Association of Public Television Stations, whose extensive experience includes working in the commercial media sector and government service in two Republican administrations, said, “it’s not a partisan issue.” He noted the extent to which local stations rely on federal funding to sustain their operations, and he described the strategic alliance that has developed which ultimately led to a successful outcome this spring. The forces opposed to public broadcasting were outnumbered, he pointed out, although there’s much more work ahead. “This is going to be a continuing battle for us for quite some time,” said Butler.

Looking ahead, Caryn Mathes, general manager of Washington-based public radio station WAMU, expressed concern over the differences she sees between the recent attempts to defund and past efforts. “The sustained nature of the attack is different,” she said, pointing out the random bills introduced in Congress that specifically target CPB or NPR funding, the continuing resolution for FY 2011, the 2012 budget debate and proposals to eliminate the tax deduction for contributions to public stations amounting to a sustained assault that public media have scarcely seen before. Her main worry, she said, is keeping public broadcasting’s constituency mobilized over a long period of time.

Recent surveys show that this constituency is not the narrow slice of high-income liberals that populist-stoking conservatives have caricatured in recent months. Bill Kling, CEO of Minnesota-based American Public Media, cited research showing that over half the American public accesses public media content every month. Paula Kerger, president and CEO of PBS, cited a recent bipartisan survey(http://www.pbs.org/about/media/about/cms_page_media/319/PBS%20Survey%20Toplines.pdf) which found overwhelming public support for continued federal funding for public broadcasting.

These figures are certainly reassuring to the leaders of public media, although there are other numbers out recently that are cause for cautious concern: a new CNN/Opinion Research poll shows that a majority of Americans believe that public broadcasting receives a much larger share of the federal budget than it actually does. Most Americans think that CPB accounts for 1% of the total federal budget, when in reality it receives a much smaller percentage, about .00014 percent.  Politico has good coverage of the survey findings at http://www.politico.com/blogs/onmedia/0411/Poll_Americans_way_off_on_public_broadcasting_funding.html.

Innovations in the Digital Realm

The second half of the symposium featured 11 innovators in public broadcasting who are developing new types of content, experimenting with new digital methods and outlets for delivery and engaging new segments of the community and new communities of interest. Panelists included

• • Jessica Clark, Director of the Future of Public Media Project at American University
  • Linda Fantin, Director of American Public Media’s Public Insight Network
  • Elahe Izadi, blogger for DCentric.org
  • Jacquie Jones, Executive Director of the National Black Programming Consortium which recently launched the Public Media Corps
  • Dick Meyer, Executive Editor for News at NPR
  • Hari Sreenivasan, Correspondent and Director of Digital Partnerships at PBS NewsHour
  • Janet Saidi, News Director of KBIA-FM in Columbia, Missouri
  • Mark Stencel, Managing Editor for Digital News at NPR
  • Kay Summer, Director of Marketing and Communications at WAMU-FM
  • Laura Van Straaten, Editor in Chief and Executive Producer of MetroFocus at WNET-TV in New York
  • Linda Winslow, Executive Producer of PBS NewsHour

Watch the Symposium, which was recorded by C-Span, at http://www.c-span.org/Events/A-Look-at-The-Future-of-Public-Broadcasting/10737421113/.

Read the white paper, Rethinking Public Media: More Local, More Inclusive, More Interactive, at http://www.knightcomm.org/rethinking-public-media/.

Related posts:

1. Why Congress shouldn’t desert public media
2. Summary: Roundtable on Public Media, Part I
3. Roundtable to Discuss Public Media Reform

The Toolkit derives from the checklist appearing in Appendix I of Informing Communities, and has been developed under the leadership of Mayur Patel of the Knight Foundation in partnership with the Monitor Institute and the Pew Internet and American Life Project. The unveiling of the Community Information Toolkit is a major breakthrough in the implementation of the recommendations of the Knight Commission, as it provides a competent means to assess a community based on one of the Commission’s core premises–that information is as vital to the healthy functioning of communities as clean air, safe streets and good schools. Of course, this is only Version 1.0, and the Knight Foundation is encouraging communities to share their experiences to help innovate a future version 2.0. To begin, go to www.infotoolkit.org. Or you can download the toolkit as a PDF here.

Mayur Patel introduces the Community Information Toolkit at the Media Learning Seminar:

Community Information Toolkit from Knight Foundation on Vimeo.

Lee Rainie, Director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project, also discusses it:

Lee Rainie, of Pew, on Community Information Toolkit from Knight Foundation on Vimeo.

Related posts:

1. Free Webinar: Knight Foundation’s New Community Information Toolkit
2. Assessing the Flow of Local News and Information
3. Assessing Community Information Needs: A Practical Guide

“Universal Broadband: Targeting Investments to Deliver Broadband Services to All Americans,” (download here) a new policy paper by Blair Levin, proposes a number of steps to achieve these goals. First, the paper outlines the steps necessary to make basic broadband available to all Americans, regardless of location. As an initial matter, the paper proposes setting a target of assuring that all Americans have access to a network capable of delivering 4 Mbps actual download speed and 1 Mbps actual upload speed. To do so requires a fund of approximately $10 billion over 10 years. This money can be obtained by repurposing existing money from the Universal Service Fund, which is no longer efficiently serving the goal of connecting Americans to the universal communications medium.

In the paper’s first major initiative, Levin recommends a ten-year transition to shift over $15 billion of inefficient USF expenditures to a more efficient system that allows for experimentation and is designed to address today’s needs. To assure deployment and operation of broadband networks everywhere, the government should

• Create a Connect America Fund to support the provision of affordable broadband and voice specifically to those areas where, without such support, broadband would not be available.

• Create a Mobility Fund to ensure no states are lagging significantly behind the national average for broadband wireless coverage; and

• Remove barriers to local government funding of broadband networks.

The paper’s second major initiative makes a number of recommendations to increase adoption of broad¬band by low-income Americans and other non-adopter communities. Cost is the biggest factor, but it is not the only factor. Digital literacy and relevance also loom large as factors affecting adoption. Government should

• Expand, and eventually transform, the current Lifeline and Link-Up programs from subsidizing voice services to making broadband affordable to low-income individuals.

• Form partnerships with non-profit agencies to address relevance barriers with targeted programs.

• Create a National Digital Literacy Corps to teach digital literacy skills and enable private sector programs addressed at breaking adoption barriers.

• Convene a working group to address adoption by persons with disabilities, a key non-adopter community

• Experiment, through a competition, to try new techniques to drive adoption.

In addition, the paper suggests that to drive both deployment and adoption, the country needs to improve broadband-related funding to community anchor institutions. This can be done by facilitating demand aggregation for public sector broadband facilities, such as health care facilities, and by enabling partnerships that focus on serving the needs of institutions that require more complex networks. The paper also recommends a number of steps to improve the use of broadband for economic development efforts, including competitions to improve broadband for economic development purposes and the creation of Model Communities for testing next-generation, ultra-high speed broadband on military bases and in designated economic enterprise zones.

Download: Universal Broadband: Targeting Investments to Deliver Broadband Services to All Americans

Related posts:

1. Changing Hearts and Minds on Universal Broadband
2. FCC Takes Steps to Implement National Broadband Plan
3. Levin Presentation: “Simple Answers to Democratize Knowledge Exchange”

Creating Local Online Hubs: Three Models for Action, a new policy paper by Adam Thierer, explores three scenarios under which community leaders and other stakeholders can work together to create local online hubs where citizens can access information about their governments and local communities. Ensuring that every local community has at least one high-quality hub is one of 15 key recommendations made by the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy.  (Download PDF or Read Online)

“Just as communities depend on maps of physical space, they should create maps of information flow that enable members of the public to connect to the data and information they want,” said the Knight Commission. In his paper, Adam Thierer takes a considered look at the many excellent online hubs already in place in American communities and explores how they can serve as models for online hubs in other communities. He proposes three general models for online hubs:

• Model 1: A Community Government Information Model, including such resources as government data feeds, civic information and events calendars;
• Model 2: A Community Connections Model, including all the information in Model 1 plus local forums and community e-mail listservs; and
• Model 3: A Community News and Commentary Model, including Models 1 and 2 plus local media and local blogs.

In addressing how to get these hubs built, Thierer cautions, “We should keep in mind the great diversity of local communities and realize that there is no one-size-fits-all, best approach to designing high-quality local online hubs. We should not assume that a hub model that works well in one community will automatically work for another.”

“Building effective local hubs will require coordination among local governments and universities, libraries and other community organizations, local businesses, local media and other supporters,” notes Thierer, who outlines specific tasks for each of these stakeholders. Notably, Thierer says that government’s role in creating high-quality online hubs “will likely be quite limited and primarily focused on (a) opening up its own data and processes and (b) providing limited funding at the margins for other local initiatives.”

Adam Thierer is currently Senior Research Fellow in the Technology Policy Program at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University in Virginia. He previously served as President of the Progress & Freedom Foundation and is well-known for his extensive writing and public appearances on issues spanning technology, media, and Internet and free speech, online child safety and digital privacy policy.

Creating Local Online Hubs: Three Models for Action is the fifth policy paper released by the Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation aimed at implementing the 15 recommendations by the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy. (See other published papers on Rethinking Public Media, Digital and Media Literacy, Universal Broadband and Government Transparency). The Commission released its landmark report, Informing Communities, in October 2009 to help promote healthy informed communities across the country.

Creating Local Online HubsThree Models for Action

A White Paper by Adam Thierer

Download | View on Scribd

Table of Contents
From Report to Action
Executive Summary

The Knight Commission Recommendation
Tempering Expectations: If You Build It, They Might Come
Scope Considerations for Local Online Hubs
Three Models for Online Hubs
– Model 1. Hubs Focused on Community Government Information
– Model 2. Community Connections: Local Forums and Community e-Mail Listservs
– Model 3. Community News and Commentary
Linking Hubs to Increase Visibility and Usability
Some Thoughts on Financing Online Hubs
Who Should Do What
Conclusion
References

Appendix
About the Author
About the Communications and Society Program

Related posts:

1. GovFresh: New recommendations for improving local open government and creating online hubs
2. Sensible Strategies for Open Government and Online Hubs
3. Video: Roundtable on Open Government and Local Online Hubs

Aspen Institute Roundtable on Public Media photo: Ian Smalley

Below is Part I of a summary of the Aspen Institute roundtable on public media reform held on December 8, 2010, to mark the release of “Rethinking Public Media: More Local, More Inclusive, More Interactive,” by Barbara Cochran, Curtis B. Hurley Chair in Public Affairs Journalism at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. Please note that this is a summary of the discussions that took place at the roundtable and not a complete transcript.

Charlie Firestone, Executive Director of the Aspen Institute’s Communications and Society Program and moderator of the roundtable, opened the discussion by welcoming participants and thanking the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation for its financial support and partnership. Firestone noted that the purpose of the paper and the roundtable discussion were to develop and advance a set of action steps to implement the public media recommendations of the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy. Accordingly, roundtable participants included key leaders from public media organizations that are at the forefront of transforming public broadcasting to meet new digital-age requirements. The group also included leading experts from think tanks, universities, Congress and the White House who could speak to specific policy and other considerations concerning the implementation of the steps proposed by Barbara Cochran in her paper. (A complete list of Roundtable participants appears at the end of this summary.) He then turned the microphone over to the author for a brief overview of her paper.

First noting that she approached the process of writing the paper as a journalist would, through research and extensive interviews, Barbara Cochran then remarked on the significant changes in the political atmosphere from the time she started work on the paper just over six months ago to its release today. In May, the environment for supporting increased public funding for public media looked rather benign, even rosy. She cited the Federal Trade Commission’s forthcoming report on journalism and the FTC’s hope for an increased role for public media, as well as the Federal Communications Commission’s inquiry into the Future of Media which also has looked at how public media can play a more prominent role in meeting Americans’ information needs. By December, the situation had changed considerably. The Juan Williams episode got conservatives interested once again in eliminating federal funding for public broadcasting, which Cochran pointed out is nothing new. There have been periodic attempts to end federal funding of public broadcasting by conservatives, some of whom who disagree on principal with such funding. But now, Cochran said, a perfect storm of economic factors, changing control of the House of Representatives, the shifting balance of power in Washington due to Republican gains in the November elections, and even the president’s bipartisan deficit commission have come together to inject a heavy dose of pessimism into the public debate.

But against this backdrop, Cochran urged that it is even more important to adopt a plan like the one outlined in her paper. She said that growth in local centers in local communities will provide the kind of civic engagement that is so vital to meeting Americans’ personal and civic needs today. Furthermore, she said, such transformations could lead to media entities that are more independent. She briefly outlined the key recommendations in her paper:

• Make public media more local, inclusive, interactive.
• Implement changes in structure and funding to accomplish these goals.
• Build on successful local models, such as Minnesota Public Radio, New York Public Radio, ideastream in Cleveland.
• Add 1,000 reporters to what is believed to be 2,000 reporters in the public broadcasting system as a whole.
• Partner with nonprofit and for-profit organizations.
• Leverage projects of the national organizations like CPB’s Local Journalism Centers, NPR’s Argo and Impact of Government projects.
• Partner with journalism schools and tap into talents of young people; make this a requirement for university license holders.
• Expand on the Public Media Corps currently being tested in Washington, D.C.
• Build-out digital platforms with sharing among national-to-local and local-to-local entities.
• Become anchor institutions in communities eligible for funding under the National Broadband Plan (rec. 8.20).

To achieve this, the structure of public broadcasting has to change.

• Break down barriers between television and radio. New structures may create divisions along content lines (e.g., arts & culture, children’s programming, education, news).
• Improve community governance structures; create community boards with digital expertise.

In funding, there is room for efficiencies and opportunity to streamline public media.

• Government should make it easier to acquire licenses, merge, or operate jointly.
• Seek a special appropriation from Congress for broadband transition, similar to the special appropriation for HDTV roll-out.
• Reach out to philanthropic partners at the national, state and local levels with a compelling new vision worthy of their support.

There was some discussion around what exactly the obstacles are to consolidation and whether FCC approval is required for mergers and license transfers. Blair Levin, Communications and Society Fellow at the Aspen Institute who served in several high-level capacities at the FCC, said that FCC approval may be required for such deals depending on the structure, “but the fundamental negating factor at this time is money.” Participants suggested that the Public Radio Fund/Public Radio Capital has been helpful in this regard.

The discussion that ensued took up these proposals in reverse order. Participants spent the majority of time first considering the outlook and options for new funding, then structural and governance changes. The discussion of strategies for becoming more local, inclusive and interactive was abbreviated, although the steps are well-outlined in the paper.

FUNDING ISSUES

The outlook on increased public funding for public media, at least in the near term, largely ran the gamut from “hyper-pessimistic” to pessimistic, as moderator Charlie Firestone pointed out that all trends are going against more funding.

Blair Levin noted, “From a balance sheet perspective, public broadcasting institutions are asset rich and cash poor.” One significant asset is public broadcasting’s trusted brand but, he continued, “there’s difficulty in monetizing the brand without destroying it.” Still, in media ecosystems that become more fragmented by the day, Levin said “it’s remarkable to have media that captures this kind of audience.”

Norm Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute and a leading advocate for the creation of a national public square via public media, placed himself in the “hyper-pessimistic” category, saying that the fact that public broadcasting was on the deficit commission’s list of cuts was “very chilling.” He went on to say that, with the new Congress arriving in January, it is likely that public media advocates will be negotiating around a funding freeze at one level or another,  not adding to current levels. With champions of public broadcasting like former Alaska Senator Ted Stevens no longer there, he cautioned that resources will need to be developed to keep the damage from being much greater.

Bruce Wolpe, counsel to outgoing House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, expects public broadcasting to take the same across-the-board budget hit that nearly every other federally-funded program will take next year. Wolpe observed that the report’s emphasis on localism is a key political factor and must be focused on relentlessly in order to show communities the value of public broadcasting. “The system is always best when it innovates up,” Wolpe said. Focus on synergies in the system, he advised, because there are funding opportunities to be found there. Examples included station consolidations, mergers, rationalization of operations, and freeing up spectrum to auction with proceeds returning to the system (he noted there is precedent for the protection of spectrum/spectrum proceeds to be used in such a manner). In a world where private media are consolidating and finding synergies, Wolpe said public broadcasting must explore these opportunities, too.

Bill Kling of American Public Media and Minnesota Public Radio provided an overview of the differences between how public radio and public television use spectrum, suggesting that the opportunities for finding efficiencies may vary by platform. Under digital broadcasting, Kling pointed out, a public television station can have six channels for programming and thus maximize the use of the spectrum they control. This doesn’t happen in radio, he said, “You don’t have a lot of spectrum you can give back.”  They key to finding additional revenues in spectrum is aligning the search with the right incentives, said Kling. He recounted how his own company was able to lease portions of its unused spectrum to Sprint for cellular use, bringing back $25 million to directly support public broadcasting. “Those who have the spectrum but don’t need it all want to be sure that they get the funding from their spectrum,” said Kling.

Blair Levin wasn’t willing to bet on spectrum auctions yielding funds for public broadcasting. “It’s an awfully sensible idea and everyone privately agrees…but things don’t happen because they are sensible,” he said. “Things happen for other reasons,” Levin said, citing political dynamics that move ideas to action. Building on an earlier comment by Bruce Wolpe, who noted the lack of a clear voice in Washington from the public broadcasting community, Levin said he just doesn’t see such a dynamic with public media at the moment.

Laura Walker of New York Public Radio thought that the concepts of innovation and reframing the debate were critical, noting that “fighting the same old battle in the same way won’t work.” For this reason, she found the proposal to seek funding for broadband-related services such as becoming broadband anchor institutions to be intriguing. The opportunities in this area will need to be uncovered and explored further.

Corie Wright of Free Press raised a concern over the impact that consolidations and mergers among public media would have on the diversity of voices in communities. Noting that the FCC has traditionally maintained ownership limits to preserve such diversity. Assuming that FCC limits are not an issue, she asked, “Would merging local [public] broadcasters have an adverse affect on community information? Is that a concern?” Some participants thought that this was not an issue for public media, particularly as ownership limits has traditionally pertained only to commercial license holders.

Complicating matters is the looming budget situation at the state level. As bad as the situation looks at the federal level, Norman Ornstein said, the situation for state and local funding looks worse. He pointed out that 47 states have balanced budget amendments and that federal stimulus money will be running out next year, which means even less money available at the state and local levels and potentially bigger problems ahead for public media budgets. While acknowledging the important value of maintaining a diversity of voices, Ornstein warned that public media transformation must move quickly or the opportunity to build high-quality media for community discussion and engagement may be lost. Ornstein raised the possibility that licenses will be sought by groups with more money to invest but less interest in broad-based, independent-minded civic discourse.

Ellen Goodman of Rutgers University Law School agreed with Ornstein that managed change might be more productive, but then posed the question, “Who manages that change?” Change management is not an area where public broadcasting has shined, observed Goodman, mainly because the systems are not performance-based. Improvements would be made if performance were more closely tied to funding, she said, with reauthorization that enacted some of the structural and governance changes and capacity-building that Cochran proposes, even if that funding is at the lower levels anticipated by nearly everyone. But the question still remains: “Who is going to drive that?”

Tom Thomas of the Station Resources Group endorsed the need for swift action on reform measures but recognized that the uncertainty surrounding funding decisions raises other concerns, such as the potential for misalignment of resources, on the one hand, and programs and mission, on the other. “How do you predict the outcome of federal funding decisions?” he asked. “By the time it plays out at all three levels of government…[public broadcasters] will have a dramatically rebalanced portfolio,” Thomas said. Considering how long it has been since the reauthorization or repositioning of public broadcasting, he continued, “steps need to happen quickly…to line-up resources that remain against the set of needs and possibilities in Barbara’s paper and other proposals in front of us.” Then, after identifying the gaps in funding, “turn to other partnerships (business, philanthropy)…to play different roles and meet different needs.”

In response to what role philanthropy might play in fostering innovation and transformation in public broadcasting, John Bracken of the Knight Foundation noted a new report which found that a majority of 154 community foundations are funding or considering funding information projects in their communities. While the interest in funding community information needs seems to be growing, Bracken noted the lag time that has existed from when awareness of the public media funding crisis first surfaced and the capacity of foundations, given their own systems and programming priorities, to define and organize what roles they may play in funding change. He also identified another source of funds. Holding up his mobile phone, he noted that mobile giving (and online giving, too) present “one opportunity…[that]goes above and beyond the traditional membership concept.” [As if to prove Bracken’s point, the day after the roundtable, the New York Times published an article on the development of and barriers to apps for charitable giving, with specific examples of public media cited.]

Before concluding the funding discussion, moderator Charlie Firestone raised the issue of public media’s perceived liberal bias and how such perceptions may impact funding going forward. “Can public media overcome the perception of being liberal?” Firestone asked. “Secondly, how are public media going to address this in the coming Congress?”

“There’s a tendency to fight the last battle with the last vocabulary—that’s not going to work this time,” replied Patricia Harrison, president and CEO of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Instead, she emphasized the need to do a better job of defining what the real value proposition is with public media in the United States right now. “It’s wrong to go down the path that we’re one of the least funded [public media systems] in the world [a fact cited by the Knight Commission and in Barbara Cochran’s paper]. In fact, that’s a strength,” she said, noting that the many partnerships and entrepreneurial innovations underway represent real successes. “I think we speak about American exceptionalism,” Harrison said. “We can’t go in like Oliver Twist, apologizing for who we are.” Pointing out that changes need to be made in all systems, including government, Harrison pledged, “We will change and improve in different ways.”

Michael Jones, chief operating officer for Public Broadcasting System (PBS), acknowledges that it’s important to look at whether public media are structured in a way that, operationally, they are using their resources most efficiently.  But he also pointed out that there are many discussions about structural transformations underway at public media organizations across the country, identifying some of the states where discussions about mergers and partnerships are taking place (California, Vermont/New Hampshire, Ohio, Florida, New York) but are not widely publicized. “Public media is not good at publicizing what it does,” Jones remarked. On the quest for revenue, Jones said federal and state dollars are both important, but public broadcasting also looks at other ways to bring in revenue as well. Reinforcing a perspective commonly held at the roundtable, Jones said public media must do a better job of articulating their value proposition without falling into the trap of using old vocabulary to fight old battles, as Patricia Harrison pointed out. Rather than focus on whether public media are too liberal, Jones proposed asking instead, “Can we provide forums for civil discourse on issues that allow the public to make informed decisions?” He also cautioned against focusing too narrowly on news and journalism when public media provide much high quality content in education, children’s programming, arts and culture, much of it drawn from local stations, to “share the wonderfulness of who we are as a nation.”

Related posts:

1. Roundtable to Discuss Public Media Reform
2. CJR Story: “Public Media: ‘More Local, More Inclusive, More Interactive’”
3. Cochran: Local Public Broadcasters Shouldn’t Lose Funding Because of Problems at NPR