Shaping and editing storytelling guides

As NPR's Director of Digital Training, I led the development and growth of our public-facing training website and newsletter.

From 2015-2018, I collaborated closely with writers to develop evergreen instructional guides in all aspects of public media storytelling, from immersive video and audio production to newsletter strategy. As an editor, I advised on information flow and page design, and I worked with illustrators and photographers to create the best visuals. I also developed launch plans and engagement strategies.

I grew the NPR Training site into a one-of-a-kind educational destination that reached more than 250k people in 2018. The site continues to be an invaluable resource for folks breaking into public media and has inspired a similar project at the USA TODAY Network.

Some of the pieces from my tenure:

Take our playbook: NPR's guide to building immersive storytelling projects

More than ever, news organizations want to build immersive storytelling experiences for audiences, where users can interact with visuals, audio and data - sometimes all at once. But the pace of technological change and our desire to tell stories in new and innovative ways often outstrip the capabilities of our content management systems and existing workflows.

training.npr.org

The ear training guide for audio producers

Ear training, the practice of learning how to recognize certain sounds, is a must for audio producers. We need to be able to spot problems and identify them to before they impact quality or snowball into larger technical problems. This post will help you identify problematic audio, prevent the most common problems and recognize when it's time to call for help.

training.npr.org

The journey from print to radio storytelling: A guide for navigating a new landscape

If you are transitioning from print to audio reporting, prepare to embark on a creative journey. Many of your skills will translate perfectly. But you'll have to change some well-established habits and adapt to new storytelling paradigms. You'll have to reconsider what you know and sometimes directly contradict it.

training.npr.org

How to develop a strong, sustainable local newsletter

Creating - and sustaining - an editorial email newsletter can be tough. Your success depends on good answers to these three questions: Every combination of answers is going to help you develop a different newsletter. We've identified three models for newsletters that are delivering results in public media, although they provide lessons for local newsletters in general .

training.npr.org

A guide to recording spatial audio for 360-degree video

As immersive video formats grow in popularity, NPR audio engineers have been experimenting with techniques for how to record high-quality spatial audio - an audio format that allows a listener to experience sound in all directions.

training.npr.org

An accuracy checklist to take with you

The checklist that follows is a reminder of things we all know we should do. It's meant to be particularly useful to correspondents and producers. They collect the information we put on the air and online and they are expected to do all they can to make sure that what we report is accurate.

training.npr.org

Score! Best practices for using music in audio storytelling

Music can help make our stories more engaging and immersive. And listeners are used to hearing music propel audio storytelling, especially on podcasts. Still, it remains controversial to score radio features, especially on NPR's newsmagazines. The main reason people object to musical scoring is that it's manipulative.

training.npr.org

6 tips for catching your writing mistakes (and protecting your credibility)

You, reporter/blogger, have been working on a story all day, and it's deadline time. You hope your story's free of typos and grammatical mistakes. But at this point, you've read it so many times, you fear you've missed something. No one is available to read behind you and it's nearly time to hit "publish."

training.npr.org

A good lead is everything - here's how to write one

I can't think of a better way to start a post about leads than with this: "The most important sentence in any article is the first one. If it doesn't induce the reader to proceed to the second sentence, your article is dead." - William Zinsser, On Writing Well No one wants a dead article!

training.npr.org

(Cover illustration by Chelsea Beck)

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