Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Illinois Press Assn. starts small-donor fund for journalism training, First Amendment advocacy

Most of the charitable programs for journalism training and advocacy are designed to attract donations from foundations and large companies, so the Illinois Press Association's foundation has started one designed to get smaller contributions from individual journalists -- the Fourth Estate Society.

"Newspaper people tend to share a really strong bond with their industry," IPA's PressLines reports. "They don't have newspaper jobs; they are newspaper people. And many of them want to share their successes with future generations of journalists and pass along the passion that they have for newspapers."

The society has five levels of annual memberships, ranging from $50 to $1,000, and a $2,500 lifetime membership. Members get public recognition, reports from the Illinois Press Foundation and invitations to events sponsored by the foundation. The contributions fund efforts to protest the First Amendment, promote literacy efforts and provide journalism scholarships for students and working journalists. (Read more)

No comments: