A Tallahassee Democrat progress report on our diversity pledge | Editor's Note

On any given Monday, Wednesday or Friday, you’ll find our Community Editor and longest-serving journalist, Byron Dobson, huddled around the large table in our conference room with the next generation of journalists.

Since restarting our longtime, formal internship program with Florida A&M University, we’ve hosted six journalists in training since Fall 2021.

And with Byron as a coach, mentor and editor, their work has been featured on the front page, grown subscriptions and changed lives. They’ve reported on new restaurants, an unparalleled FAMU homecoming, the unique FAMU outdoor club, efforts to diversify NASCAR, and disturbing behavior at a football game. They’ve been witnesses and chronicled history when the USS Tallahassee was celebrated and when a bell purported to have sailed with Christopher Columbus hit the auction block.

Embracing a diverse newsroom:Here's the Tallahassee Democrat 2022 staff census

It’s something of a full circle moment for Byron, who also manages our opinion pages in print and online. A couple decades ago, Byron ran an earlier iteration of that internship program when online journalism was in its infancy. In fact, three FAMU grads who worked as interns the last go-around went on to become top newsroom leaders in the USA TODAY NETWORK.

More:Three top newsroom leaders credit Florida A&M University for their success

This time, things are very different in the industry, and yet the students are on the same path.

Our latest interns have gone on to graduate from FAMU’s heralded journalism program and taken the lessons learned to large TV markets in neighboring states and as far away as Oregon, when one former intern is still working within the USA TODAY NETWORK, where she got her start at the capital city newspaper.

A diversity pledge progress report

The internship program has been a core part of a five-year diversity pledge we made back in 2020. When last we spoke, I announced that the Tallahassee Democrat and USA TODAY NETWORK papers around the country had committed to reflecting the diversity of their communities in newsrooms by 2025. To be transparent with our audience, we released racial diversity data at USA TODAY and 100 network newsrooms including the Democrat.

This column is something of a progress report.

While I highlighted an “unacceptable disparity” two years ago, I’m happy to say we’ve made strides in more closely representing our community. But there’s still plenty of work to be done.

While 43% of Leon County residents are people of color, they make up only 31% of our newsroom. Journalists of color, meanwhile, now hold 33% of our leadership positions, a vast improvement from two years ago. While women make up more than 52% of the capital county, our newsroom falls short of parity with 41%. 

You can see the exact data online but one thing to note is we are a small newsroom – only about 20 people – so a one-person change can represent a shift of almost 5% to 17%. 

Bridging the gap

Here’s the successes we’ve seen, how we’ve been working to bridge the gap and where we are going in the years ahead.

• The Tallahassee Democrat and USA TODAY NETWORK have for years required that a diverse pool of candidates be considered for every opening. We’ll continue to actively build a pipeline of talent that taps into excellent candidates who are also people of color.
• We’ve already begun the competitive selection process to bring three more FAMU journalists-in-training into the newsroom this fall. We’re looking to build on the program in 2023 and place graduates in positions throughout the USA TODAY NETWORK.
• The company continues to invest in numerous leadership and development training programs to advance future leaders. Our business and economic development reporter TaMaryn Waters, another veteran journalist, was recently selected to join the 2022 class of the Leadership Tallahassee program. On top of that, TaMaryn was recently awarded the prestigious Maynard 200 Fellowship, which aims to empower journalists of color to provide advanced training and mentorship while promoting career growth and expanded leadership roles.
• A few months back, Byron was given the Voice of Courage award saluting African Americans in Media. His Tallahassee Democrat family was honored to be in the audience and cheer him on as a number of civic groups lauded his three decades covering the community.
• Two of our newest journalists, Christopher Cann and Ana Goni-Lessan, are on a mission to give a voice to the voiceless. A project months in the making that published late last year began when Chris and Ana, both Spanish speakers, recognized a central voice was missing amid the community condemnation and hand-wringing about a surge of shootings involving teens and young adults in the capital city. They broke bread with teenagers, hung out with them on the basketball court and got to know them and their struggles in a city where poverty can cast young Black men into survival mode. The resulting stories are now finalists in some of the top journalism contests in the state and nation.

An investigative report:'It's breaking them': Amid guns and poverty, Black teens often wind up in survival mode

We need your help to tell Tallahassee’s story

As a Star Trek fan, I’ve always admired the Vulcan philosophical concept of “Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations.”

While it’s hyperbole to be sure, to do our jobs effectively and fairly, we need that idea of “infinite diversity” to tell stories from the varied voices and perspectives that make Tallahassee the unique place that we’ve come to love and call home.

We also need your help. I always want to hear from you if we’re overlooking a story from your community or if there’s a good story we don’t know about. Email me at news@tallahassee.com or leave me a message at 850-599-2177 and I’ll return your call. We also urge you to contribute your views on addressing local issues and what is and isn’t working in our community by writing Your Turn columns for the opinion section and emailing us at letters@tallahassee.com

Thanks for joining us on the journey.

William Hatfield is editor of the Tallahassee Democrat. Email him at whatfield@tallahassee.com. If you support this initiative or want to support local journalism, subscribe at offers.tallahassee.com

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