WASHINGTON, DC — The Online News Association (ONA) and The Poynter Institute are collaborating again to offer a transformative, tuition-free leadership program to train digital media’s best and brightest women in Spring 2016.
The second ONA-Poynter Leadership Academy for Women in Digital Media, offered to 28 U.S.-based participants, will take place the week of May 2, 2016, at Poynter’s campus in St. Petersburg, Florida. The interactive, five-day program will focus on critical leadership skills specific to digital media for the industry’s next generation of women leaders.
Poynter and ONA will build upon the dynamic 2015 program, whose faculty included more than a dozen standout leaders in technology and media. Sessions will be structured to encourage open, candid discussion and mentoring, and participants will walk away with not only strong leadership skills, but a built-in support system.
“In a short space of time, the women at the ONA-Poynter Leadership Academy for Women in Digital Media became my most trusted advisers, greatest champions and dearest friends,” said Kari Cobham, social media analyst for Cox TV stations and a member of the first leadership class. “The program and having this cohort transformed my career and my life.”
ONA and Poynter will look to unite a group that represents need and diversity across ethnicity, age, geography, technology platforms, organization size and skill sets. Applications will open in January 2016. Because of the small size of the class, the selection committee will give preference to emerging leaders currently working in digital media who can demonstrate an aptitude and potential for leadership through current projects and references.
Tuition is free, thanks to the generous support of the program’s naming sponsor, The McClatchy Foundation, as well as additional funding from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and Craig Newmark. Participants will cover their own travel costs, but a limited number of travel stipends will be available.
This unique partnership will combine the efforts of the world’s leading digital media organization, ONA, with the global leader in professional journalism education, The Poynter Institute.
Poynter and ONA are seeking additional funding from media and technology companies, foundations and academic institutions. At ONA, contact Jess Strelitz at jessica@journalists.org. For more general information, contact ONA’s Jennifer Mizgata at jennfer@journalists.org, and Tina Dyakon, Poynter’s director of advertising and marketing, at tdyakon@poynter.org.
About the Online News Association
The Online News Association is the world’s largest association of online journalists. ONA’s mission is to inspire innovation and excellence among journalists to better serve the public. The membership includes news writers, producers, designers, editors, bloggers, technologists, photographers, academics, students and others who produce and distribute news for digital delivery systems. ONA also hosts the annual Online News Association annual conference and administers the Online Journalism Awards.
About The Poynter Institute
The Poynter Institute for Media Studies is an international leader in journalism education, and a strategy center that stands for uncompromising excellence in journalism, media and 21st century public discourse. Poynter faculty teach seminars and workshops at the Institute in St. Petersburg, Florida, and at conferences and organizational sites around the world. Its e-learning division, News University, www.newsu.org, offers the world’s largest online journalism curriculum in 7 languages, with more than 400 interactive courses and 330,000 registered users in more than 200 countries. The Institute’s website, www.poynter.org, produces 24-hour coverage of news about media, ethics, technology, the business of news and the trends that currently define and redefine journalism news reporting. The world’s top journalists and media innovators come to Poynter to learn and teach new generations of reporters, storytellers, media inventors, designers, visual journalists, documentarians and broadcast producers, and to build public awareness about journalism, media, the First Amendment and protected discourse that serves democracy and the public good.