Black kids in the U.S. are in deep trouble. Barack Obama reminded us of that in a Father's Day speech a few weeks ago.

A little more than one-third of the black children live with both their parents. The majority of black kids -- 54 percent -- live with only one parent and that's overwhelmingly mom. A home headed by a single mom often equals an economically poor home.

Why should readers care that a majority of black children are being raised by their mothers? Black children, along with Latino children, are future taxpayers. They will help pay for city and county services and your Social Security.

Minority kids now make up 45 percent of the little tots who are five years old and younger. Increasingly they live in the suburbs. That means minority kids, who are overwhelmingly black and Latino, will increasingly pay for the services and the Social Security of aging Baby Boomers.

We've been reporting on poverty and black children for at least 30 years. It's often a controversial topic. But now their future will determine our standard of living.

Nearly half of the black kids living with their mother -- with their dad AWOL -- are poor. Seventeen percent of the black kids living with both parents are poor. (Census PDF, p. 12)
 
Obama alluded to this in his Father's Day speech when he said: "... if we are honest with ourselves, we'll admit that what too many fathers also are is missing from too many lives and too many homes. They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it."

How are other kids doing? Well, nearly three-quarters all the children live with both their parents. (Census PDF, p. 4)

Some people trace the breakdown of the black family to slavery. Wrong. "The proportion of black children living with two parents declined most sharply in the 1970's falling from 58 percent in 1970 to 43 percent in 1979," said a report from the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, which tracks such statistics.

"They are going to start out in poverty. They will go to schools that are failing or will be labeled as failing, said Roderick Harrison, the founding director of DataBank at the Joint Center. "At 17 they are three years behind the white students."

The gaps don't get closed by the education system --- this leads to the higher dropout rates, higher unemployment rates and single parenthood again, he said.

A high school graduate in the U.S. can expect to earn about an average of $29,000, according to Census Bureau stats. Earn a college degree and that average annual income jumps to $54,689.

A workforce with less education earning less money means less money going into Social Security.  That sound you might hear is our standard of living crashing.

By Sally Lehrman

Does your organization identify alleged criminals by race? There seems to be a fresh push to do so, based on the view that omitting race is "politically correct silliness," as someone e-mailed me. Race is always pertinent, I've heard from readers, because it helps "conjure up an image."

It's that image that interests me, an image that ought to give us pause.

Eyewitness reports aren't always reliable [PDF], as crime reporters well know. No matter who we are, we often match memory to our expectations. A simple hairstyle change -- from an Afro to slicked-back black "Hispanic" hair, in one recent study -- can shift our perception of someone's facial features to match.

There's plenty of criminal justice data that call into question race descriptions, especially considering how much the descriptions can vary by geography, by generation and by the particular genes handed down from mom and dad. I attended a meeting this month where forensic anthropologists bemoaned the trouble they had with race. While they can usually estimate ancestry from a skeleton, there's no guarantee that it will match the "race" described by a sheriff, the family or even a missing person herself. A "Hispanic" for forensic purposes in one case, for instance, turned out to be "African American" to a sheriff.

Think about it: In crime stories, we try to describe the purported culprit based on a glimpse caught during a confusing, emotional moment. How sure can we be that our sources are right? And if they're wrong, what difference does it make?

Those who worry about "PC" policies probably anticipate a vague argument here about racial stereotyping. Stereotyping, though, is not just a theory or a misinformed way of thinking. It has consequences in the real world.

African Americans show up in crime stories more often than any other topic, and then disproportionately as the accused [PDF], not the affected. Maybe it's not surprising, then, that white people exposed to our work automatically tend to associate crime with black people. They'll even conjure up a black suspect where none exists.

In one study in Los Angeles, researchers slightly altered a regular television news story to include a mug of a black suspected perpetrator, a white one, or none at all. When audiences weren't offered a picture, 44 percent remembered seeing the mug of a black man. And when they did see a mug of a white person, they didn't remember seeing any perpetrator at all.

Robert Entman and Andrew Rojecki detail the impact of news on stereotyping with depth and precision in their 2001 book, "The Black Image in the White Mind." But even their arguments are theoretical for most white people - until we sit with a black or Hispanic family and listen to parents talk with their sons about how to respond if caught "driving while black."

Again, if you're white, you may think these families are paranoid. They're not. They reap the harmful effects of the images we sow. 

In 12 states, whenever someone is arrested in California for a crime, his or her DNA goes into a databank. Now this person and all his or her relatives are formally a potential criminal in every other crime checked against the database.

As long as you're not a criminal, does it matter to be listed among them? Well, DNA labs do make mistakes. Journalists in Washington, North Carolina, Virginia and Texas investigated performance and reported a surprising number of DNA sample mix-ups and other lab errors.

The Society of Professional Journalists' Ethics Code asks journalists to be "honest, fair and courageous." Is news coverage fair when we put a whole category of people under suspicion? We should "minimize harm," the code continues. What are the consequences, we must ask, of the images we conjure?

By Susan M. LoTempio

If the mission of good journalism is to give voice to the voiceless, then covering issues of disability should be part of that mandate. The trick, of course, is not to be sidetracked by the physical issues but to explore where and how society resists the inclusion of its citizens who have physical, mental or emotional needs.

Two recent news stories are good examples of that intersection.

In May, a federal judge ruled that the government discriminates against blind people by printing money that looks and feels the same.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury was ordered to find a way for blind people to tell the bills apart. But the government maintains that changing the size or texture of the bills might make it harder to prevent counterfeiting.

Until now, blind people have had to rely on electronic money readers, which they say are slow, unreliable and expensive. Or, they had to rely on the honesty of others to give them the correct change.

Do you know any American who would hand a $20 bill to a cab driver or a store clerk and assume they're getting the right change? Most of us count the change. Blind people cannot.

The backlash to the court order is predictable and illustrated by this online comment to an Associated Press story: "I know being blind sucks, but how much inconvenience and cost should the rest of society bear?"

The answer can be found in your city or town by talking to those most affected by the court ruling. Here at The Buffalo (N.Y.) News, we interviewed Karen Kane, who runs a newsstand at the county office building. She told our reporter how she folds her bills in different ways to try to distinguish 1s from 5s from 10s and 20s.

But, she says, "you have to trust everyone you come in contact with to tell you the truth."

The American Council of the Blind says this is a huge issue for blind people as both consumers and business owners.

But we wouldn't know that unless we gave them a voice.

The other hot topic focuses on hybrid cars. Blind people who use service dogs or guide themselves with canes are worried because hybrids are much quieter than traditional cars, posing a danger when they use streets and crosswalks.

The National Federation of the Blind wants the hybrids to sound the same as gas-powered vehicles, but those pushing for reducing noise pollution are resisting the idea.

Though most drivers and pedestrians likely haven't noticed the difference in the noise level, for blind pedestrians it could be a matter of life and death.

And with the media focusing on the cost of gas and finding alternative sources of fuel and gas-saving vehicles, the issue of safety for blind pedestrians shouldn't be overlooked.

By Keith Woods   RELATED RESOURCES The Front Page Primary: Newspaper fronts from January '08 | Super Tuesday fronts | March 5 fronts | April 23 fronts | May 7 fronts | May 14 fronts | May 21 fronts | June 4 fronts   Looking for a Few Good Election Headlines   Virtual Communities Spark Coverage Ideas As Primary Season Ends   Poynter Online Political and Campaign Coverage

NewsU Course: Understanding & Interpreting Polls The historic 2008 presidential primary season is over. Another unprecedented campaign lies ahead. Take a breath. Then make a vow to handle one of the hottest issues in the campaign -- race relations - better than ever.

Clearly we're not done with the subject. We may be spared the clumsiness of Sen. Joe Biden's inarticulate racial compliments over the coming months. We may never again hear Geraldine Ferraro's simple-minded explanation of Sen. Barack Obama's appeal. We may be spared another spooling of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright's reckless damnation.

But before November 4, we will almost certainly meet once more at the scene of a racial conflagration. On calmer days well debate whether we should say "black" or "African American," "Latino" or "Hispanic." This nation and the media covering it aren't especially deft at talking about ethnicity or race matters. Thus, things often get twisted, contorted, overblown and distorted. Nearly every word explosive, which only adds to the journalistic muddle. If you aspire to a higher standard, use a few lessons from the primary season to prepare for the coverage ahead.

Let's start with the first sentences of your story. Is Barack Obama really "trying to become the first black president," as so many journalists write? That phrase or its variant has been a staple of news coverage, and it suggests that Obama is pursuing a racial, not political, achievement. You can find the language in ABC's coverage of the final primaries: "The issue of race cropped up again and again for the man seeking to become the nation's first black president."

It was in the Associated Press's story the day after Obama clinched the Democratic Party's nomination: "Obama, battling to become the nation's first black president and one of its youngest ..."

It looked like this in a blog entry from a political editor of the Boston Globe (which makes the same logical leap about Sen. Hillary Clinton and her gender): "The chairman of two national women's magazines today switched his allegiance from Hillary Clinton, seeking to become the first woman elected president, to Barack Obama, trying to become the first black president." You can find a reference to Obama's "quest to become the first black president" in the Shanghai Daily and any number of news outlets around the world. Here's the problem with the phrasing: It lumps two facts together to impose upon Obama a motivation for running: 1) He wants to be president. 2) If elected, he'll be the first black president. Splice them together and you get: "He wants to be the first black president." Unless the candidate says the racial "first" is his goal -- or you can otherwise prove that's what motivates him -- it's an assumption masquerading as a fact.

For accuracy's sake, separate facts from motive. It's as simple as what the television station eitb24 in Spain wrote on its Web site: "Obama now becomes the first black man to run as the nominee of a major party in the U.S. general election. And should he win, he'll become the first black president in the history of the United States."

When the general election campaign is in full swing and one of the candidates, or their supporters - or their pastor - steps into a steaming heap of racial mess, report the fallout responsibly. Raise the level of journalism to bring light, not just heat. Remember that your mission is to inform, not judge. Answer three questions for your audience:

• What did they say? Don't just give the sound bite, paraphrase or partial quote. Let your readers, listeners or viewers have the benefit of the whole thought.
• Why does it matter? Provide context, definitions, whatever your audience needs in order to understand the offense. Don't assume we all know the same history. We don't.
• What did they mean? Everyone, including people who were thinking the controversial thing that someone else said, deserves to have a shot at fully answering this question. When Geraldine Ferraro said, "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position," the best question, the one we heard the least, was this one: What do you mean? Don't assume you know. Don't assume we know.

And when you get to that point again where you're trying to help your audience understand how different groups of voters regard the candidates, ditch the euphemisms. What is the "lunch bucket democrat" I read about in Mother Jones?

What's a "NASCAR dad," a "Soccer Mom," or the "blue collar worker" I keep hearing the guy on CNN talk about?

What do we mean by "working class" and how are those people different from "blue collar workers" and "NASCAR dads"? Journalism has created or parroted a dictionary's worth of empty phrases meant to describe the voting populace. Encoded with racial and class assumptions, they are to information as cotton candy is to nutrition.

Just as this remarkable campaign now moves into a phase of higher stakes, so too should your journalism rise to the greater reaches of excellence. Especially on the issues that matter. Especially on race.

By Mallary Jean Tenore

When reporting on race, finding the courage to ask tough questions can be difficult. But it's the questions that make us vulnerable and challenge us to step outside our comfort zones that can lead to untold stories. The Chicago Tribune's "Exploring Race" forum encourages users to ask the tough questions, such as, "Are immigration reform marchers missing a key demographic?", "Will Obama 'enslave' the white race?" and "How do you change the racial perspective of a grandmother or a grandfather who's not exactly 'racist,' just set in ways and beliefs about people ...?"
The Chicago Tribune
Here are some preliminary questions to consider before asking the tough ones:

• By asking this question am I being insensitive?
  
• How might I frame the question differently so as not to offend the person I'm interviewing?
  
• How important to the story is the question I'm about to ask?
  
• What questions am I avoiding, and why?

To genuinely answer these questions, it helps to assess the prejudices and preconceived notions that we bring to a story. "Exploring Race" offers links to quizzes and videos in its "Etiquette" section to aid in this assessment. "Exploring Race" also has a section called "Eyewitness," which features readers' accounts about how race has affected their lives, and another titled "Revelations," which includes essays about race-related learning experiences.

On the right-hand rail of all these sections is a "Question and Answers" feature, a reminder of the importance of creating a dialogue about race.

Chicago Tribune columnist Dawn Turner Trice, who started the forum, said tough questions can sometimes lead to diatribe, but they can also spark healthy dialogue. "If you read some of the comments on the site, it's true that there's a vocal group that spews venom," Trice said. "But it's also true that some people have achieved a sort of nuanced color-blindness in which they appreciate racial differences and work hard not to stereotype or discriminate against people because of them."

She said she got the idea for the forum after Sen. Barack Obama won the caucuses in Iowa, a predominantly white state. "I wondered if there was some paradigm or something slightly askew with our thinking on race," Trice said. "We Americans paint with such a broad brush. It's in our national DNA. I wondered if we need to start picking apart how we see one another."

By painting broad strokes, we tell generalized stories. By picking apart issues and asking tough questions, we make way for stories that speak to greater and more meaningful truths about diversity.

What is your news organization's Web site doing to help foster a discussion about race?

By Aly Colón

RELATED "People Without Paperwork," by Mary Sanchez

"Life Behind the Label," by Aly Colón

"Black, black, or African American," by Aly Colón

"Accent on Accuracy," by Aly Colón
How we identify people who enter the United States without following proper immigration procedures has become almost as complicated as the immigration issue itself.

A variety of descriptions appear in print, online and on the air. Here are just a few:

• "Illegal immigrant"
• "Illegal alien"
• "Undocumented immigrant"
• "Illegals"

Ted Vaden, a staff writer for The News & Observer in Raleigh, N.C., tackles this issue in a thoughtful column. He pegs his piece to his paper's recent coverage of "students without documentation" and the question of whether they should be entering the community colleges and universities of North Carolina. 

Vaden identifies the terms, looks at his paper's style guide, interviews others facing similar labeling challenges and quotes the N&O's front page editor's defense of the term "illegal immigrant." He writes:

Steve Merelman, The N&O's front-page editor who oversees word usage, defends the current illegal immigrant standard. The phrase describes reality under current law, he said, and if people have a problem, they need to change the law.

"I don't see much point in perfuming what some people think stinks," he said. "We can call them 'undocumented' or we can call them 'unauthorized,' but it still doesn't stop them from being deported. It seems cold, but that's our job -- to take a cold-eyed look at things."

Vaden then offers his own view, which would "loosen the style manual to allow undocumented and unauthorized."

I can understand Merelman's view, and I appreciate Vaden's flexibility.

As a journalist who has written about and edited many stories involving diverse issues and people from different backgrounds, my inclination is to avoid labels as much as possible. Try to describe as accurately as you can the people you are covering. The more specific, the better. What we, as journalists, think we save by using a label and fewer words, we more than make up for in confusion, bias, prejudice and distortion. Labels limit us. And they limit the reality we see.

By Susan M. LoTempio

RELATED "Disabled Group Members Arrested at McCain's Office," The Associated Press

"John McCain Gets Tax-Free Disability Pension," Los Angeles TimesOne of the hot-button issues for Americans with disabilities is institutional care versus in-home care for people who get Medicaid assistance. Currently, the regulations lean toward putting people in nursing homes, rather than paying for care in their own home.

Disabled or not, which would you prefer? For many people with disabilities it's a no-brainer: They want some assistance so they can stay in their own homes.

A few weeks ago, a group of disabled activists connected to ADAPT, a group that's worked on this issue for years, caused a bit of a ruckus outside Sen. John McCain's office in the Russell Senate Office Building. They wanted to meet with the Republican candidate for president about a bill that would amend the Social Security Act to allow people who are eligible for Medicaid coverage of nursing home costs to spend it instead on home-based or community care.

McCain was not in the office at the time, but more than 20 activists were arrested and charged with unlawful assembly. The candidate's staff said the activists did not have an appointment to speak with him. The activists, many of who are wheelchair users, are frustrated that the bill, supported by Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, has been stuck in committee since last year.

And stuck is exactly how people with disabilities feel -- stuck that they can't choose where it's best for them to live, and stuck because so little attention has been given to the issue by the mainstream media.

There's a bit of irony in the fact that it was McCain's office the activists stormed, considering the nation recently learned that the senator collected close to a $60,000 "disability pension" from the Navy.

According to the Los Angeles Times, his staff explained that "McCain was retired as disabled because of his limited body movements due to injuries as a POW." So, does that make John McCain officially a person with a disability?

It's doubtful he'd ever identify himself as such, though being seen as a disabled veteran has seemed to work for him at times on the campaign trail.

McCain's official Web site claims he "has been a leading advocate in the Senate for disabled veterans throughout his entire career." But on issues important to non-veterans, disabled activists say McCain hasn't been so supportive.

I'm waiting for reporters to get McCain on the record regarding the proposed Medicaid changes, the weakened Americans with Disabilities Act and the plethora of other issues that affect 54 million Americans with disabilities. These issues range from too-high unemployment rates to too few educational opportunities to too-high poverty rates.

We know McCain's position on the Iraq War, on immigration and on the federal budget. Now it's time to ask some other questions.

By Sally Lehrman

Wouldn't you love to have an audience that is "passionate," "committed" and "engaged"? That's the way Kay Madati and Lynette Clemetson describe the people who visit their Web sites, who discuss, comment and meet up over the news every day.

Madati heads up marketing for Community Connect, a set of social networking Web sites directed at niche audiences: black Americans, Asian Americans, Latinos, religious people and the GLBT community -- or as the site calls it, "gays, lesbians and everyone else." Clemetson manages editorial for theroot.com, an online commentary and news site that emphasizes black voices.

Don't dismiss the high level of involvement in these spaces as a phenomenon of the Internet. Mainstream news outlets might have enjoyed the loyalty of the news, information and entertainment junkies that frequent such sites. But "a dumbing down, a lack of nuance, push people out," says Clemetson, who used to cover social and political issues for The New York Times and before that, Newsweek. People flock here -- and targeted online news media in general -- because "they're not represented by general market media or engaged by it," Madati agrees.

In journalism training sessions sponsored by the Society of Professional Journalists and MarketWire a couple of weeks ago, Clemetson and Madati spoke often about the "authenticity" their audiences demand. That may seem like an ideal that is difficult to penetrate, a characteristic a journalist is lucky to be born with but probably can't learn. Fortunately, though, these niche sites rely on very accessible techniques: a profound understanding of their audience, an authority about relevant topics and a habit of heading straight into areas of depth.

These practices are simply a matter of attention and care, with a strong dose of respect for the people who rely on us for news. Clemetson warns about the assumptions we make about certain groups -- would a mainstream news outlet, for instance, hire a black chef to share healthy recipes and write about "eco" soul food? Check out Bryant Terry's Eco-Soul Kitchen and see what you think.

Bruno Lopez, who runs the online operations for Univision.com, offered advice that we've heard again and again, yet still seem to find it hard to follow. "You have to go outside of your newsroom and see what people are talking about," he suggested. Besides sending people out onto the street, Univision tabulates the topics that float up as top search queries and editors check in on online community discussions.

Lopez also warns against assuming that any "niche" community is monolithic. The Spanish speakers who Univision serves, for example, cut many ways in their views, concerns and culture. Univision must think carefully about audience fragmentation by national origin and generation. Editors even created a pan-Hispanic style guide to ensure that terminology will be easily understood -- and not insult -- people from a variety of "Hispanic" backgrounds. At the moment, people of Mexican descent make up more than half of Univisions market, but South Americans are rising in volume online. "We monitor (our users) for national origin to see whether our main page needs to be shifting in response," Lopez explains.

Such attention to audience helps create a space where users can deepen their exchanges beyond the superficial. On theroot.com, for instance, users are discussing the relationships between Africans, African Americans and people from the Caribbean. Niche sites may offer a safe space for debates that hardly ever make it to the mainstream. But the mainstream overlooks far too many discussions and a level of depth that might add vibrancy to the news for all of us.

By Keith Woods
RELATED
"Beyond Rape: One Survivor's Story," by Joanna Connors, The Plain Dealer

"Telling Our Own Stories, Becoming Better Journalists," by Mallary Tenore, The Poynter Institute

In her remarkable story, "Beyond Rape: A Survivor's Journey" Joanna Connors, a reporter at The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer, writes about her experiences getting raped. But the story isn't just about rape. It also addresses important issues of race and class.

The essential tension resides in a simple and explosive event, now 20 years old: A black man raped a white woman. The history of that potent narrative is packed with truth and lies, racist injustice and racial suspicion, cliché and mythology.

This story lurches powerfully into race in the first of five chapters, as Connors speculates that she might have run away in the awkward moments before David Francis attacked her had it not been for the fear that she'd appear racist. A few paragraphs later, readers learn that the rapist taunted Connors, asking if she'd fantasized about sex with a black man. That's a pretty raw entrée into race in what was already a bold step into another taboo.

Then things really get interesting. Connors tracks down Francis' family and interweaves her story with theirs. As I followed her into the black and poor side of Cleveland, I found myself bracing. Would some misguided liberal guilt cause her to ennoble this man and his family, with their hard upbringing and harder lives, now that she'd seen up close the truth of the country's racial and class divide? Would she stumble into stereotype or worse? Would this become part of a long list of bleeding-heart tales that end with, "and I found out these poor black people were just like me"?

No. No. And no.

The beauty of the story -- beyond the excellent reporting and writing -- is that it embraces the complex messiness of race and class so that you can feel repulsed and sympathetic before getting from one end of a paragraph to the other. That sort of writing rejects the idea that there is a single, grand truth to deliver and, instead, lays out a set of conflicting images that cause you not to judge, but to think. I had a lingering question when I was done, which I sent to Stuart Warner, the editor who called my attention to the piece:

[Connors] spoke one simple truth that I think I'd wanted to hear more about: That it was her desire to not appear to be a bigot that might most be responsible for the decision to go into that theater [where Francis raped her]. That's a much scarier racial truth, to me, than the more mundane, 'I found myself afraid of all black men' truth that she was hesitant to speak. Because if white women -- or white people in general -- were to act on the first notion, that you question your racial motivations at your great peril, then in a way we'll encourage more acts of exclusion and outright prejudice.

What I wanted her to explore was what a right-thinking white woman does when she realizes that she made a bad move based on a good motivation. Is there another answer than to just listen to those voices in your head that say danger when you see a black man? The lesson is certainly not to ignore that voice. What, if anything, is in between?

Connors wrote me to say that there was one more element to inform her fateful decision in the theater -- what she called the "good girl tape" running through her head. It says, "don't be rude," Connors wrote, and it might have caused her to follow a white man into the theater 20 years ago for fear of offending him in another way. The lesson about race in all that, to me, is that journalism's pursuit of simple cause-effect stories leads us to stop too early in interviewing, falling short of mitigating facts that would paint a less absolute -- but more accurate -- picture of things racial.

One last note about the series: among the reasons the editors decided to run the package in a single day rather than spreading it out over five days had to do with race: the cumulative picture of the black characters in the story is nuanced and deep. But The Plain Dealer staff decided that it was easy to see little more than stereotype if you read some of the chapters out of context. It's something to think about any time you're following a developing story about race relations or racial conflict.

By Keith Woods

I appeared the other day on a segment of the NewsHour with the University of Pennsylvania's Kathleen Hall Jamieson and The Wall Street Journal's Gerald Seib to talk about how race is being handled in coverage of the presidential nominating process.

RELATED Transcript of NewsHour discussion
I raised two issues (I could think of 20) journalists need to take up, particularly covering the democratic primaries: dumping the race and class euphemisms that serve as proxy for a real discussion about these defining issues, and parsing the racial voting patterns in a way that's more thoughtful and accurate.

We talked about some of those euphemisms: Soccer moms, NASCAR dads, lunch bucket Democrats, blue collar workers -- used as substitutes, in one construction or the other, for white people. Hall Jamieson added that journalists should do away with the imprecise (or downright meaningless) phrases that make their way into stories about race relations: Sen. Obama's "post-racial" candidacy, for example, or "the race [or gender] card."

The point I most wanted to make, though, was this: throughout this campaign, journalists -- especially the 24-hour cable set -- have parsed the racial vote by providing all manner of categories for white voters -- including the euphemisms above, while reporting on black voters as though their motivations are all the same. Asians, Latinos and Native Americans don't fare any better when they're mentioned at all.

So you get phrases like, "African American voters and liberals," as though liberal is a race to which black people don't belong. The more insidious effect is that journalists ascribe complex -- if hardly comprehensive -- motives to why white people vote the way they do, without spending much if any time doing the same for black people.

So a white voter might be weighing class ("blue-collar voters"), education ("uneducated white voters") gender ("women voters") geography ("rural voters"), or who knows what else as they decide between senators Obama and Clinton. Black voters? Well, they tend to vote for Obama.

Why? I can't say I've seen much effort to answer that one, leaving the public to conclude that black voters are basing their votes on nothing but race. Immediately after the show, I got an e-mail from a woman who said I had missed the point totally, but who, instead, made my point.

"While you undoubtedly have good arguments," she wrote, " ... these arguments really don't apply to discussions about the Democratic primary. This is for the simple reason that almost the entire African American demographic supports Mr. Obama irrespective of differences within the community such as education, wealth and gender. Accordingly, in this context, making other distinctions is pointless. ... I imagine that most African-Americans support Mr. Obama because they think their interests will be most fully protected by him, and they are probably right. It isn't all that complicated.

Wouldn't it be nice if journalism did a good enough job that this woman didn't have to "imagine" what motivates black voters and that she understood the full range of calculations at play when a black person stands before the ballot box? It may not be "all that complicated," but it is much more complex.

By Mallary Jean Tenore

A new study released last week reveals that 58 percent of black children can't swim and that they drown at nearly three times the average rate. An estimated 56 percent of Hispanic children can't swim, compared to 31 percent of Caucasian children.

The findings are the result of a USA Swimming survey intended to help bring more black people into the sport and lessen the number of minority drownings. Experts from the University of Memphis surveyed 772 children aged 6 to 16 in six cities, two-thirds of whom were Hispanic or black. In conducting the survey, researchers learned that there is an important race and ethnicity element to their findings.

The Associated Press explains:

The minority swimming gap has deep roots in America's racial history. For decades during the 20th century, many pools were segregated, and relatively few were built to serve black communities.

John Cruzat, USA Swimming's diversity specialist, said these inequalities were compounded by a widespread misperception -- fueled by flawed academic studies -- that blacks' swimming ability was compromised by an innate deficit of buoyancy.

''There are people who still give credence to these stereotypes, even in the black and Hispanic community,'' said Cruzat, who wants to break the cycle that passes negative attitudes about swimming from one black generation to another.

Most black and Hispanic children surveyed said they did not consider swimming to be a "white sport," even despite the fact that black people make up less than 2 percent of USA Swimming's 252,000 competitive swimmers, according to the AP.

The minority swimming gap is a story worth localizing. With summer vacation approaching, you may want to visit your local pools and see what the demographics there are. If the majority of children are white, what are children of other races/ethnicities doing instead? How does the cost of private pools affect the demographics of families who swim there? How does all this tie into pool safety? What does a day in the life of a public pool v. a private pool look like?

Exploring such questions can help turn a report about a survey's findings into a story about the people behind the numbers.

By Thomas Huang

RELATED Blog posts:
"Girl Gone Mild," by Mary Elizabeth Williams, The Takeaway.

"The Miley Cyrus/Vanity Fair Saga," by Jamie Lee Curtis, The Huffington Post

"Sexualizing Miley: Are Billy Ray and Tish Cyrus Letting Her Be the New Lolita?" by Bonnie Fuller, The Huffington Post

News stories:
"Who's Minding Miley?" Forbes.com, April 28, 2008

"Disney Taps Wants, Wallets of 'Tweens,' The Boston Globe, Nov. 6, 2006

"In the Concert Hall, It Smells Like Teen Spirit," The Washington Post, Aug. 6, 2006

"Marketing and Tweens," BusinessWeek, Oct. 12, 2005

"Disney Finds Place for Tweens," USA Today, Oct. 26, 2005

"Tweens: A Billion Dollar Market," CBS News, Dec. 15, 2004

"Disney's Tween Machine," Fortune Magazine, Sept. 29, 2003

For those of you who think the Miley Cyrus controversy is frivolous, let me be contrarian. Once you get beyond the celebrity titillation factor, it's a multi-faceted story that would benefit from thoughtful reporting and analysis.

To recap: Cyrus, an actress and singer, plays Hannah Montana on the Disney Channel. Her sitcom and concert tour have reportedly made the company more than $1 billion. Last year, Forbes ranked the 15-year-old among the Top 20 earners under 25. Young girls adore her -- especially "tweens" between the age of 8 and 12.

This week, Vanity Fair posted online photos of Cyrus taken by Annie Leibovitz. In one, Cyrus is wrapped in a sheet, with her back and shoulders bare. Quel shock! 

Outraged parents swarmed blogs. Disney accused the magazine of manipulating the teen. Cyrus at first called the photo "artistic," then apologized to her fans: "I feel so embarrassed." Vanity Fair responded by saying that Miley's parents or handlers had been with her during the entire photo shoot, and that they had looked at the digital images ahead of time.

This all transpired before the magazine was even out on newsstands. (It was available in New York and Los Angeles on Wednesday, and will be available on most newsstands next week.)

My first reaction was: Much ado about nothing. Tell me more about the Iraq war, the Jeremiah Wright flap, the home mortgage crisis. But when I thought more about it, I realized there are several dimensions to the Cyrus story -- all worth exploring through serious journalism.

Business: This is a story about big business, with a whiff of manufactured controversy. Tweens spend an estimated $30 billion of their own money and influence $126 billion in spending by their parents, according to one youth marketing firm.

And Disney has perfected the art of marketing to this age group. It has created a factory of young, clean-cut stars and, as The Washington Post's William Booth noted, promotes them via "the company's television channels, podcasts, Web sites, movies, theme parks, DVDs, record labels, radio stations, products and concerts."

Problem is, these young stars have a limited shelf life with Disney, aging out a la Logan's Run (sorry, most tweens wouldn't understand that reference). So you can begin to see how an "edgy" photo shoot would make business sense for Cyrus and her family.

Mary Elizabeth Williams, a critic who blogs for Public Radio International''s new program, "The Takeaway," argues that Cyrus "won't remain frozen in adolescent amber. She's growing up, and if she wants to take her fans into adulthood with her -- and have the career longevity her charisma and talent could bring -- she has to grow into a more mature persona."

Taking this one step further: With the amount of money Disney has at stake here, do you really believe the company was unaware of the photo shoot? If it was aware of the shoot, was it clueless about Leibovitz's provocative approach? At least through quiet acquiescence, could this not be a calculated move on Disney's part, as well?

Gender and sexuality: This is a story about the confining stereotypes that girls grow up with in our culture -- for Cyrus, it's played out on a public stage. For guidance, I talked with Kelly McBride, Poynter's ethics group leader, who has led workshops on the coverage of sex and sexuality.

McBride asked, "How, as a girl, do you explore your sexuality in the limelight" if you become famous before you've established the sexual side of your personality?

In today's culture, "it's hard for girls to figure out what kind of girl they want to be," McBride said. "There are such narrow stereotypes. There's the 'pure Christian,' the 'bookish feminist,' the 'slut,' the 'trophy girl.' The boundaries are so harsh in these categories, and they defy reality.

"For girls who are watching this happen [to Cyrus], this doesn't inform them, it doesn't help them," she said. "They are living through the same thing. They are trying to figure out who they are -- and every piece of clothing they wear, every choice they make, is seen through the sexual lens.

"By posing with a sheet, Miley is a 'bad girl.' She's broken her stereotype" of being a "good girl." But in the real world, "most 15-year-old girls are exploring who they are. The problem is that Miley doesn't have people who are shielding her, she has people exploiting her."

Popular culture: The Cyrus controversy strikes me as part of a recurring, formulaic narrative that we in the media either help create or at least reinforce when it presents itself in pop culture. We've seen young, female celebrities like Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan go through similar dramatic arcs -- the innocence, the controversy, the apology, the publicity, the punditry and the money-making for everyone involved in the story.

In a column about Spears' decline, Poynter's Roy Peter Clark pointed this out about such celebrities: "By 16, she has become completely sexualized by the culture. Every move, every gesture, every mistake in judgment comes under the most intense scrutiny. And we wonder, even as we let the spectacle wash over us, what went wrong."

Disney, Vanity Fair, Annie Leibovitz, Miley Cyrus and her country-singer father Billy Ray Cyrus, Cyrus' handlers, the media, the bloggers -- we all seem to know what our roles are in this, and we play these roles well.

But even though she's making tons of money, Cyrus is the one potential victim in all of this. One can only hope she does not meet the same kind of unhappiness her predecessors have.

By Aly Colón

The coverage of the controversial Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. continues cascading down the political news stream and carries with it issues of religion, race and resentment. The furious flow of information tends more toward the political than the "r" factors.

But whatever the focus, we need to provide context about what is being said. We need a more comprehensive understanding of Wright, his views and how representative they are.  

We need to ask questions and hear from diverse voices. That requires journalists to seek out sources who not only agree, or disagree, with Wright's views, but who occupy space across the spectrum between those two extremes. We also ought to raise questions about assertions that Wright represents and/or speaks for "the black church."

Here are some questions we might pursue:

• How representative is Rev. Wright of the pastors who pastor a "black church"?
• What does he mean when he speaks of the "the black church"?
• Is there one theology common to such a church?
• Do "black churches" interpret scripture the same way?
• Do other "black churches" see whites the way Wright does?
• How is the Christian perspective in the "black church" similar to or different from that of a "white church," or "Hispanic church," or "Korean church," to cite just a few examples?

I'm sure journalists could come up with more questions. For more information, background and a variety of perspectives, you can start with such sources as Religion Link's guide to African-Americans and religion.

Then there are sites that focus on press and religion. One is "The Revealer," which is based at New York University and consists of a team of editors and writers. Another is "Get Religion" which also has a team of writers. The site has published blog items about the news media's coverage of Wright for some time. Terry Mattingly posted a piece about Wright recently on Get Religion. Mattingly also writes a column on religion for Scripps Howard News Service and has written about religion for Poynter's "Journalism with a Difference" column, which laid the foundation for "Diversity at Work."

The key here is to expand our understanding as journalists so we can do the same for those who rely on us.

By Thomas Huang

RELATED "Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth About Violent Video Games" -- Excerpt on race-related games.

"Remembering 7th Street: The Oakland Jazz and Blues Clubs Reality Project," background information.

"Reviving Oakland's Jazz and Blues Scene, Virtually," National Public Radio

"Mind Games: Points of Entry," The New York Times

"Why Journalists Should Develop Video Games," MediaShift Idea Lab

"Black Professionals In Games: NGai Croal Talks Stereotypes, Finding Video Games Spike Lee," MTV's Multiplayer blog

"Heroes in Black and White: Diversity in the World of Games," Aly Colon, Poynter Online.

I have no doubt much will be written about this week's debut of "Grand Theft Auto IV" -- most likely framed in menacing and cautionary terms.

But let's take the popularity of such games and explore their potential for interactive, player-directed storytelling: News organizations will increasingly experiment with video games -- or computer simulations -- to help players learn about news events and trends.

Imagine, for example, learning more about the Gaza Strip conflict by not only reading about it, but playing a political video game. Well, such a game, "PeaceMaker," has already been developed at Carnegie Mellon University.

Using video games for journalistic storytelling is not far-fetched. The New York Times last year published a game to help readers understand immigration legislation that was up for debate.

"Serious games" are already being developed to help players learn about health, social, political and economic issues. Check out these sites to learn more about "serious games":

• Water Cooler Games
• Social Impact Games
• Games for Change
• Impact Games
  

Paul Grabowicz, a professor at the University of California-Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, is working on such a game with his students, using funding from a Knight News Challenge grant. With their "Remembering 7th Street" project, Grabowicz and his students hope to create a virtual replica of an Oakland street known for its jazz and blues club scene in the '40s and '50s.

"A newspaper or other local news organization needs to be more than just a pipeline for informing people about current news and events," Grabowicz wrote in the MediaShift Idea Lab blog. 

"It also should provide context for people to understand their community and its history. A video game can do that, by letting people re-live the history of their communities and understand not just what's happening today but what came before."

As news organizations experiment with journalistic storytelling in video games, they must also deal with this critical question: How can these computer simulations best reflect diversity?

The "Remembering 7th Street" project is one positive example. Grabowicz sends his students out into the community to gather historical information so they can present the street's African American heritage in an authentic way.

But as Aly Colon pointed out in a previous Diversity at Work piece, diversity is not well-represented in most video games. And when it is, it typically comes in the form of a stereotype. Even worse, some games traffic in hate.

"Today there are a lot of games -- many of them available for free -- that make no bones about spewing racist, sexist, homophobic, and anti-Semitic beliefs, often wrapped in attempts at humor," write Dr. Lawrence Kutner and Dr. Cheryl K. Olson, directors of the Harvard Medical School Center for Mental Health and Media and co-authors of Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth About Violent Video Games.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting that we censor such games or demand political correctness in, of all things, violent video games. What I'm suggesting is that if part of our mission as journalists is to educate our readers about diverse communities, and if we venture into the world of journalistic video games, then we'll need to find a way to marry the two. Part of that will depend on how diverse the staffs are that produce video games -- and how well schools are developing such diverse talent.

Editor's note: This is the first of a two-part series about using video games to tell journalistic stories.

By Mizanur Rahman


RELATED VIDEO
"Juan's Story: Undocumented but Not Un-American"
"You've always been there, but you really don't count."

Those are the words of a young man named Juan in Miami, who suddenly feels pushed into this dehumanizing corner: You don't matter any more.

Why? Because he graduated from high school.

For most of us, turning 18 and leaving high school feels like being paroled from the long sentence of adolescence.

But for Juan, it's like being convicted for something you didn't do.

The Colombian native is among a unique class of people in the U.S. He's an undocumented immigrant who journeyed to America at age 6 with his parents.

The fact that Juan's family broke the law to come here matters to many -- but not to the U.S. Supreme Court. Some 25 years ago the court ruled that all undocumented children are entitled to a free public education.

But once they graduate from high school, all bets are off. You can't work. You can't get a driver's license. You face deportation. A bill to legalize these students has languished in Congress for years. Critics say we shouldn't unfairly reward people who immigrated here illegally.

Newspapers have long written stories about the murky no-man's land facing these students. Ive edited many. But surprisingly, Juan's personal story, the most powerful I've seen so far on the issue, did not come from a mainstream newspaper. Or a magazine. Or TV.

In fact, it didn't even come from a traditional journalist -- but from the emerging social media-stream.

Juan's story is told in a video and essay produced by the Movement Vision Lab at the Center for Community Change, based in Washington, D.C. The Movement Vision Lab, an online space that started last year, says it brings together grassroots organizers and activists to discuss visionary ideas for humanity's future. I guess they're not a bunch of slackers over at the lab.

Read more.

By Mallary Jean Tenore

RELATED NPR Interview: "Documentary: Racism Harms Your Health"

Documentary Web site:
"Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick?"
When I think about racism, I think about emotional pain, ignorance, the need for equality. So when I recently saw the words "racism" and "health care" clumped together, I wondered why.

In a recent Google Alert for the term "racism," I came across a National Public Radio piece about a new documentary series titled "Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick?" The documentary looks at the ways that racism affects our health. Many minorities, the documentary says, have greater health issues than their white counterparts. The documentary cites several examples of this, including one about black mothers in the U.S. being far more likely to have premature births and low-birth weight babies than white women.

Lou Smith, co-executive producer of the documentary, said during the NPR interview that this problem is not innate to being black, but rather to the conditions of race that black people live with.

His colleague Larry Adelman, creator and executive producer of the documentary, agrees. "I think the everyday experience of racism ... puts one's body on alert, which means it triggers the stress response. Your heart beats faster, your blood pressure rises, blood sugar rises," Adelman said during the interview. "What scientists are finding is that if that stress response is turned on, even at a low level ... it weathers the body and puts you at risk for all the chronic diseases."

"Unnatural Causes" profiles the Hispanic community as well, saying that Hispanics who cross the border into the U.S. are generally poorer, but healthier, than the average American. The longer they are in the U.S., the quicker their health erodes. Hispanics are 1.5 times more likely to be obese and to have high blood pressure, the documentary says, than when they arrived.

Living conditions and discrimination have also affected southern Arizona's Pima and Tohono O'odham Indians, who have one of the highest rates of Type-2 diabetes in the world, according to the documentary. The reason why is startling: During the 20th century, the Pima's agricultural economy was disrupted by the diversion of river water to upstream white settlements. Tribes became poor as a result, and healthy foods like cholla buds, wild game and tepary beans were replaced by foods that fuel diabetes -- white flour, processed cheese, lard and canned foods.

There are plenty more examples like this that may be playing out in your own communities. Talk to the minorities in your coverage area. How has the discrimination they've faced factor into their overall health, if at all?

By Mizanur Rahman

It's becoming an uncomfortably familiar question in newsrooms when someone with a Spanish surname is a crime suspect: Is he illegal?
 
Calling Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to check the immigration status of some Hispanic suspects is now routine. It wasn't always this way -- not even a few years ago, either here at the Houston Chronicle or at my former newspaper, The Dallas Morning News. And this is Texas -- a border state with 1.6 million illegal immigrants [PDF], a state with countless citizens whose grandparents swam the Rio Grande to reach Texas soil.
 
But the winds have shifted. Illegal immigration has boiled in the last two years under the flames of mass protests, nativist rhetoric and failed reform efforts in Congress. Homeland Security has also issued one of the largest criminal be-on-the-lookout alerts in our history by significantly increasing enforcement along the border and the workplace to root out illegal immigrants.
 
This momentum has heightened sensitivities surrounding illegal immigration, making it a "cause célébre" for the likes of CNN anchor Lou Dobbs and FOX News' Bill O'Reilly.
 
The climate is ripe for local stories about illegal immigrants charged with crimes to explode into the public's consciousness. Like the story of Juan Leonardo Quintero, an undocumented worker accused of fatally shooting a Houston police officer in 2006.
 
The feverish reaction to this case is mirrored by similar stories in Phoenix, Los Angeles and South Florida.
 
So it was not surprising when an Arizona Republic editor recently contacted the Chronicle inquiring about our policy on identifying the immigration status of crime suspects. Like many newspapers, we don't have one since it's a recently emerging issue. It was also understandable when a Chronicle reporter asked me, the immigration editor, if the paper was on a witch hunt against Hispanics after our most recent story about a homicide involving an immigrant.
 
Mexico native Jose Jesus Vieyra was charged with criminally negligent homicide less than a day after Harris County sheriff's deputy Craig W. Miller crashed his SUV into Vieyra's truck in Houston Feb. 21. The collision killed Miller.
 
Sheriff's officials initially said Vieyra caused the crash by veering in front of Miller. When we learned Vieyra was an illegal immigrant, we quickly reported it on Chron.com. Reader comments on the Web story were fast and furious: Deport all illegal immigrants. Enough is enough.
 
But a few hours later we changed the Web story after ICE officials said Vieyra came to the U.S. legally in 2006, but had overstayed his visitor visa.
 
The story changed more dramatically weeks later. The medical examiner reported that Miller was highly intoxicated when the crash happened. His blood-alcohol level was more than three times the legal limit in Texas.
 
Houston civil rights activists say anti-immigrant hysteria compelled Vieyra's quick arrest. The League of United Latin American Citizens called for an independent investigation into how the sheriff and district attorney's office handled the case.
 
Stories like this and others leave journalists navigating enormously complicated questions of fairness and ethics. These stories force us to confront criticisms that we could be propagating anti-immigrant fears and misperceptions. Recent studies, including one by the Harvard sociologist Robert Sampson, show that neighborhoods that undergo immigration actually experience comparatively lower levels of crime.
 
Immigration, in some respects, is like another thorny identifier in stories: race. We've been taught that you only identify one's race if race is central to the story. Immigration status mandates a similar threshold. (Of course, identifying someone's race will never get them deported.)

Officer Rodney Johnson's killing, on first glance, is a story about a horrible crime. But if questions about the suspect's legal residency emerge, then his immigration status becomes important because of this fundamental point: The crime might not have happened if the suspect wasn't in the U.S. without authorization. It's a concern family members of victims, prosecutors and others will raise.
 
For example, say an illegal immigrant faces intoxicated manslaughter charges for killing someone while driving drunk. Immigration status is relevant in this case because in states such as Texas, illegal immigrants are prohibited from getting a driver's license.

The residency status of immigrants (legal and illegal) charged with a crime is also pertinent because that status determines if they face deportation. Even legal permanent residents can be deported if they're convicted of aggravated felonies or minor theft crimes.
 
Listing punitive consequences a charged suspect faces is important in any story. It's why we include how much prison time a criminal conviction carries.
 
That's a case for including immigration status in some crime stories.
 
But in daily practice, journalists now face a minefield of questions. Should we call ICE to check the immigration status of ALL Hispanics charged with serious crimes? Should we only inquire about status if police are uncertain about the identification and residency of an immigrant suspected of a crime?
 
When considering these questions, it's worth noting the obvious: All Hispanics aren't immigrants. And all immigrants aren't Hispanic. In fact, the fastest-growing group of illegal immigrants in the U.S. is from India. So should we report on immigration status of Indians charged with crimes?
 
And here's where things get more complicated: Suppose that immigrant charged with a crime is found not guilty. But he's still in the U.S. illegally, so he gets deported. Whether we report the immigration status or not, authorities will uncover the residency status. So though we didn't aid in his deportation, we have published someone's immigration status. Someone who has been found not guilty.

Someone potentially like Jose Jesus Vieyra. The homicide charges against Vieyra, who remains in jail, could be dropped since it appears the deputy was drunk. But if even Vieyra is released, he very likely will be deported.
 
[How does your newsroom handle the issue of identifying the immigration status of crime suspects?]

By Aly Colon

RELATED "Why Journalists Should Develop Video Games," by Paul Grabowicz.

"Testing News Game Concepts," by Kathleen Hansen.
The search for diverse stories requires journalists to go to diverse sources of information.

Sometimes that means going to diverse institutions. Sometimes that means seeking out diverse people. And sometimes it benefits us to look at places that may not seem diverse in the stereotypical way we think of diversity, but that lead us in diverse directions.

Recently, I found such an opportunity for a diverse story idea at Slashdot, which has the slogan "News for nerds. Stuff that matters." An April 13 post by kdawson, which generated about 600 comments, noted that an anonymous reader raised an issue about African Americans and video games.

"African Americans spend more money and time playing video games than whites, yet only 2 percent of game developers are black," the reader wrote.  

The post points to two other sites with more information. One of the sites is Intelligent Gamer, which prints highlights of MTV's Multiplayer blog featuring interviews with black gamers and their views on stereotypes in the games.

In a Multiplayer blog post, Morgan Gray, a senior producer at Crystal Dynamics, an American video game developer, said: "I am sick of playing the average white dude character. I'm just done with it. And I'm sick of playing a black stereotype." He notes he did come across a black police officer in a game. "But as a player I want to have more experiences other than the futuristic super soldier white guy to the unlikely hero white guy."

On the Multiplayer blog, you'll find other people with a variety of insights about the diversity of the games and the stereotypes they see.

The real world we inhabit offers a window into just one stereotypical reality. Other worlds with other realities present their own diversity issues and opportunities for a different type of diverse story.

By Bobbi Bowman

More important than how the U.S. Census does the 2010 Census count is who gets counted.

Last week, Al Tompkins, broadcast and online group leader at The Poynter Institute, wrote in his Morning Meeting column that the high-tech, hand-held computers U.S. Census field workers were supposed to use to get an accurate count don't work. They'll take the Census the old-fashioned way with pencil and paper.

The question of who is counted is important because the census has always been about power. The founding fathers understood this. This census, which began in 1790, was created to determine how many seats each state would have in the U.S. House of Representatives. The more people a state has, the more representatives it gets.

Once the founding fathers had reached a compromise over big states vs. small states by creating the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives, the discussion about who to count started.

The southern states, understanding the census was about power, wanted slaves counted. Slaves were property under the law. They had no rights and no legal standing. But when it came to the census, southern politicians considered them as persons to be counted because doing so meant they would have more power.

Lots about the census has changed throughout the years, as this August 18, 2007 press release suggests:

"The Census Bureau has not requested that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency refrain from enforcing immigration laws. While previous Administrations sought to have law enforcement raids curtailed somewhat to help obtain greater accuracy, we respect ICE's statement that they will not suspend raids even if a decision were made to ask them to do so. The Census Bureau fully recognizes that times have changed, with new challenges facing immigration authorities, and Census will change with those times."

The U.S. Constitution (Article I, Section 2) requires that the Census count everyone in the U.S. regardless of how they got here. Immigrants now account for 40 percent of the growth in the U.S. population. Accurately counting immigrants is therefore crucial to obtaining an accurate count.

The New York Times reported in 2001 that Arizona gained two more seats in Congress "largely because of a soaring Hispanic population in the state in the last 10 years." New Jersey saved a congressional seat in 2000 because of immigration. Nearly half a million people left New Jersey between 1990 and 2000. But nearly an equal number of immigrants moved in.

The people most apt to be under-counted are minorities and the poor, according to The New York Times piece. An undercount like this can affect everyone.

By Tom Huang
Ethics and Diversity Fellow

WASHINGTON -- Let me be a realist, if not a pessimist: The diversity numbers released by the American Society of Newspaper Editors on Sunday worry me.
          
A lot.
           
At first glance, the overall numbers dont seem too gloomy: In the past year, the percent of minorities working at daily newspapers grew a smidgeon -- from 13.43 percent to 13.52 percent.
           
But it's the absolute number we should be worried about.

RELATED
-- 2,400 Jobs Lost: Biggest Dip in 30 Years, by Rick Edmonds

-- ASNE Census Report

-- With ASNE Diversity Numbers Again 'Dismal,' Minority Orgs Shift Strategy, by Mark Fitzgerald (E&P)

The only reason why the percentage of minorities in newsrooms has essentially remained flat is because both white and minority journalists left our newsrooms at about the same rate (resulting in an overall 4.4 percent decrease in full-time journalists at daily newspapers).
           
The total number of minority journalists at daily newspapers fell by about 300 people -- from 7,400 to 7,100.

To be more specific, in the past year, an estimated 671 minority journalists left newsrooms. At the same time, only about 392 other minority journalists were hired for their first full-time newsroom job.
           
That's a big problem: Since 1986, with the exception of one year, the number of minorities coming in the door has always outpaced the number of minorities going out -- sometimes at as high a ratio as 2-to-1.
           
In other words, even though newsroom management across the country has not done a great job in retaining minority journalists, it has made up for this by recruiting new talent. But it's not clear that kind of replenishment is going to be possible with as little hiring as newsrooms are doing moving forward.

At the ASNE conference, I tracked down two high-profile diversity advocates: Caesar Andrews, executive editor of the Detroit Free Press, and Gilbert Bailon, editorial page editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

"We're at a point of stagnation," said Andrews, ASNE's incoming treasurer and this past year's diversity committee chair. "... These are not the worst results, but it's frustrating. It doesn't represent significant progress. And its at odds with [ASNE's] stated mission of diversity."

ASNE's goal is to have the percentage of minorities working in newsrooms nationwide equal to the percentage of minorities in the nations population by 2025.

Yes, it's harder to maintain newsroom diversity when facing an overall reduction in hires. "We all see that," Andrews told me. "But I'd still make the case that if diversity is the urgent priority we say it is, then we still need to figure out how to get different results ... If were not going to have robust opportunities for hiring, then we have to figure out ways of retaining people.

"If not, you set yourself up for perpetual battle."

In the past year, minorities made up roughly one out of every seven journalists who left our newsrooms.

"That's of concern," said Bailon, who is outgoing ASNE president. "We can't reverse that trend quickly, given the [limited] amount of hiring thats going on. It will take quite a bit to reverse that process.

"We're treading water," he said. "We're not decreasing by percentage, but that's overshadowed by having far fewer journalists of color. In a smaller newsroom, if you lose two or three [minority journalists], thats a dramatic shift."

Meanwhile, another dramatic shift is occurring: Some larger newspapers, like The (San Jose, Calif.) Mercury News, have lost minority journalists from their senior leadership ranks, he said. "Key players are gone," he said.

From my vantage point, the loss of journalists of color from the decision-making tables could lead to even greater challenges to reflecting diversity in our coverage and hiring.

And it's not going to get any easier. If we're treading water now, here are three trends from the ASNE census that tell me rough seas lie ahead:

• From 2003 to 2008, the newsroom retention rate for minority journalists fell from 97 percent to 91 percent. "If we don't develop a better track record in keeping good people longer ... we're fighting a losing battle," Andrews said.
  
  
• From 2006 to 2008, the number of minorities in their first full-time newsroom jobs fell from 567 to 392. The opportunities to bring new, diverse talent into our newsrooms are decreasing.
  
  
• From 2005 to 2008, the number of minorities in newsroom internships fell from 948 to 706. How will we maintain, let alone increase, the diversity of our newsrooms if we are giving fewer minority journalists the chance to develop their skills?
  

Andrews argues that this is not just a numbers game. It will have a direct impact on the quality of our journalism.

"If we're intending to connect to various audiences, with coverage thats relevant to the lives of our audiences, somehow our coverage has to come across as authentic and of the community," he said. "A diverse mix of ideas and perspectives is central to how well and how quickly we can connect..."

There is one bright note in all of this, and perhaps it sheds light on a way forward. For the second year, ASNE counted full-time journalists working online. Of the nearly 1,700 full-time journalists working only on their newspaper's Web operations, 17.79 percent are minorities. That compares favorably to the 16 percent found last year.

This is not rocket science. I'm sure Andrews and Bailon would agree: Strategically, despite all of the challenges we face, if we as an industry want to increase the diversity of our newsrooms, we will have to develop programs that train a diverse mix of journalists how to do sophisticated online work. Let's spark that conversation now.