The 2025 Advancing Democracy initiative supports journalists working at the intersection of trust, engagement and solutions journalism to reimagine how they cover politics, elections and government.

Led by the Solutions Journalism Network (SJN) in partnership with Hearken and Trusting News, this initiative builds on the success of the Advancing Democracy Fellowship, which ran from 2022–2024, and SJN’s Building Democracy Fellowship in 2025.

We’re offering a number of opportunities aimed at helping your newsroom launch or build on this work. They are:

✅ Webinar Series: Join us for insights from leading journalists working to create a more community-centered and solutions-focused approach to politics and government coverage.

✅ Online Course: Hosted by the Knight Center, A Better Way to Cover Politics offers self-guided training in the core Advancing Democracy skills. Perfect as a refresher or for new staff in your newsroom.

✅ Coaching: Newsrooms that complete the Knight Center course will be eligible to receive personalized coaching to implement what they’ve learned.

✅ Innovation Fund (currently open to Advancing Democracy alumni only): Apply for up to $4,000 to support an innovative reporting project that uses one or more skills from the fellowship and is tied to coverage of government, elections and/or politics—plus coaching and support along the way.

Sign up here to learn about upcoming events and opportunities.

We’re equipping newsrooms with the support they need to shift political, elections and government reporting away from horse-race narratives and candidate-centered coverage, and toward journalism that focuses on the issues communities care about most. We prioritize storytelling that highlights solutions, fosters transparency, and adds nuance and healthy discourse to political reporting.

Along with the Solutions Journalism Network, Hearken and Trusting News, we’ll also offer additional guidance from the experts at Good Conflict.

Participating newsrooms will build skills in the Citizens Agenda approach, solutions journalism, engaged elections, Good Conflict and audience trust-building.

What this looks like in practice:

• Ditch the Horse Race: Build audiences and trust with community-centered, solutions-focused campaign coverage
• How several Advancing Democracy newsrooms avoided polarization in political coverage
• How Capital B’s and WITF used election FAQs to get on the record about their approach to covering elections 
• Resources for Better Election Coverage from Knight Election Hub and Election SOS

Since 2022, more than 50 newsrooms have gone through this training. They report that it has helped them increase the audience for their journalism, attract new readers, listeners and viewers, and increase community engagement. Professor Sue Robinson of the University of Wisconsin, who is researching the impact of this program, recently shared her findings that engagement, solutions-focused reporting, and trust-building coverage increased twofold to threefold in participating newsrooms, while horse-race reporting saw a significant reduction. We’re excited to support political, elections and government reporting that has more impact, and is more trustworthy and more connected to what your community needs.

---

This initiative is a joint initiative from Hearken, Solutions Journalism Network and Trusting News.

Solutions Journalism Network (SJN) is leading a global shift in journalism, focused on what the news misses most often: how people are trying to solve problems and what we can learn from their successes or failures. Since its founding in 2013, more than 600 news organizations and over 27,000 journalists worldwide have engaged with SJN’s in-person workshops, online resources, collaboratives, fellowships and cohorts.

Hearken is a social impact consultancy that uses the power of community engagement to impact and influence systems for the public good. Hearken is an expert in deep listening, and their pioneering public-powered model and technology solutions have resulted in newsrooms around the world building listening and engagement into their strategies, workflows and bottom lines. 

Trusting News examines how people decide what news to trust and turns that knowledge into actionable strategies for journalists. Its staff trains and empowers journalists to take responsibility for demonstrating credibility and actively earning trust through transparency and engagement. In a continual cycle of research, learning and sharing with the industry, Trusting News explores how to incorporate trust-building into journalism’s standards and practices.

This initiative is made possible with financial support from the Henry Luce Foundation, Joyce Foundation, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and Solutions Journalism Network.

For questions about the program and curricula, contact Jaisal Noor (jaisal[@]solutionsjournalism[.]org).

For questions about supporting the program, contact Elizabeth Share (elizabethshare[@]solutionsjournalism[.]org).