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Join Us for the 2025 Freelance Conference!
Early bird tickets are on sale for our annual freelance conference. Sign up now to enjoy 12 interactive online sessions on Feb. 27-28 for just $59. You'll learn what 40+ editors want from freelancers and hear how experienced independent journalists thrive. Go beyond surviving in the new year.
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![Columba Journalism Review article on journalism layoffs survey]()
Journalism Layoffs Survey Results
8,300 journalists were laid off since 2022, or 9% of the labor force. The IIJ's 2024 survey found disproportionate impact on women, journalists of color, and younger professionals. Read the full results, funded by the Field Foundation of Illinois.
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Pitch a Session!
Propose a topic, speaker, or idea for the IIJ's 2025 conference -- or volunteer to help us plan it. The conference will be live, online Feb. 27-28 and we want your input!
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IIJ Webinar Series
Check out the IIJ's freelance webinar series on Fridays from 12-1:15 p.m. ET, featuring panels on science and business pitching, surviving layoffs, finding journalism-adjacent work, and more! Learn from editors and writers for the NYT, Salon, the Wirecutter and more.
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![SAH, Kelly and Shernay at the Chicago Workshop]()
Meet the IIJ This Season
Join us this season as the IIJ travels to the NLGJA, ONA and AccessFest conventions, and check out our past events.
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![Hand with red pen marking journalism layoffs]()
Stand Up for Journalists!
Can you spare 5 minutes?
We’re taking a census of laid off journalists to understand the impact on our field. Please help by sharing our layoffs survey with colleagues - or take it yourself!
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Our Chicago Freelance Workshop
Check out our freelance workshop in Chicago, including editors from the NYT, Chicago Sun-Times, and Essence. Our curriculum teaches you to build a sustainable practice.
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Watch Our Webinars
Improve your pitching, refine your book proposal, learn the craft of long-form narrative, and land a fellowship in our free webinars for freelancers. (Watch recordings of past webinars on our YouTube channel).
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Meet The Team
Get to know the team behind the Institute for Independent Journalists! Learn about our mission and background. Maybe join us?
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Stay in Touch
Join our email list to be the first to read announcements and register for our events. We typically email weekly.
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Take the Survey!
Help us build the IIJ’s programs by contributing your thoughts in our freelance survey. Just 10 minutes of your time will improve our offerings. Thank you in advance!
About The IIJ
The Institute for Independent Journalists is an education, professional development, and mutual support organization for independent journalists, focusing on Black, Indigenous and people of color. Our mission is financial and emotional sustainability for independent journalists of color, through community learning, innovation and advocacy.
Principles of belonging
We are committed to serving all independent journalists by offering a diverse set of perspectives and featuring presenters who represent a variety of identities. We aim to prioritize racially diverse individuals and the most marginalized groups in our programs. Some events will be open to all; some will include only those who self-identify as BIPOC, which includes but isn’t limited to Black, Indigenous, Hispanic, Asian American, Middle Eastern and North African, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander.
Our mission
To ensure financial and emotional sustainability for independent journalists of color, by:
Connecting freelancers for learning, collaboration and mutual support in a space that centers marginalized voices and facilitates authenticity and vulnerability.
Creating tools, services and shared wisdom for economic self-sufficiency and mental health, regardless of churn in journalism or who controls newsrooms.
Advocating for fair and equitable treatment of freelancers and best practices for ethical use of independent labor, throughout the media.
Steering Committee
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Katherine is a science journalist and author based in the Washington, D.C. area who writes about education, equity, mental health, parenting, journalism, and social justice for publications including The Atlantic, The New York Times, Nieman Reports, Parents, and The Washington Post. Her 2018 book The Good News About Bad Behavior grew out of Mother Jones’ most-read article. A biracial woman (Asian American and White), she previously worked as a national correspondent for Newhouse News Service and Bloomberg News.
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Erika is a writer based in Southern California. Her feature stories appear in The New York Times Magazine, Wired, The Atlantic, Marie Claire, MIT Technology Review, Slate, The New Republic, The Guardian, Newsweek, Time, Glamour, Foreign Policy, and others. Erika has been a Knight-Wallace Reporting Fellow and an Alicia Patterson Fellow, and she is interested in the intersections of identity, race, psychology, inequality, science, technology, history, and the human condition. She is a former national correspondent for the Los Angeles Time and currently teaches at the University of California, Irvine as a professor in the Literary Journalism Program.
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Sa’iyda is a writer and editor who lives in Los Angeles with her son, partner and too many pets (3) She writes about the intersections of parenting, race, sexuality, gender and socioeconomic status as well as lifestyle and pop culture. A former writer and editor at Scary Mommy, her work has also been published by The New York Times and The Washington Post.
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Sarah Stirland is a writer/radio and podcast producer living in Silicon Valley. She co-teaches, produces, and edits San Francisco Bay Area high school student stories for KALW’s Summer Podcasting Institute. The Institute publishes an award-winning podcast called tbh.
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Shernay spent more than a decade as a journalist for television, radio, and print outlets throughout the South and East Coast before serving as a business coach, running a content firm, and in 2020, launching The Black Mompreneur. Recently Shernay became host and producer of a digital series for TheGrio called "A Taste of Chocolate," where she visits notable Black-owned restaurants to learn the stories behind their food.
Leadership Team
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Ellen is an independent journalist in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her writing has appeared in publications such as The New York Times, The Wirecutter, The Atlantic, Real Simple and the San Francisco Chronicle, where she was a business and technology reporter. She serves as the co-director of the Asian American Journalists Association Freelance Affinity Group and co-director of the AAJA Media Institute. She loves Broadway musicals, peppermint chocolate and sleep.
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Lygia Navarro (she/her) is an award-winning bilingual journalist working in long-form narrative print and audio. Lygia has reported on Latine stories from across Latin America, North America and Europe, for outlets including Afar, Al Jazeera magazine, The Associated Press, Business Insider, the CBC, The American Prospect, FRONTLINE/World, Marketplace, The World, Latino USA, The Pulse, Virginia Quarterly Review, Switchyard, Today.com, and the Christian Science Monitor, among many others.
Lygia is also an essayist and has produced podcasts for Spotify and The Conversation Canada. Her work has received national prizes and awards, and has been supported by multiple grants and fellowships. She holds both a BA and a Master’s (in journalism) from the University of California, Berkeley. In addition to reporting, Lygia is also an editor at palabra, the multimedia outlet of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, and a mentor for the Uproot Project’s Environmental Justice Fellows. Together with Rux Guidi, Lygia co-founded Narrative Gigs, now a project of the IIJ. Lygia is a proudly queer, disabled and neurodiverse advocate for inclusion and equity.
Founding Leaders
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Meena is an editorial Swiss army knife embracing media entrepreneurship. She’s a freelance writer covering travel and business for publications including Travel+Leisure and Fortune and an audience development consultant specializing in helping publishers build high value audiences.
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Frances is an award-winning journalist, essayist, activist, scholar, and poet focused on issues of Asian America, race, justice, and the arts. Her writing has appeared at PBS NewsHour, NBCAsianAmerica, PRIGlobalNation, Center for Asian American Media, Cha Asian Literary Journal, and more. She co-created a multimedia artwork for Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center, she is a Knight Arts Challenge Detroit artist and author of a book on the Vincent Chin case, and You Cannot Resist Me When My Hair Is in Braids, Wayne State University Press.
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Jamila Bey is the editorial director of WHYY News and was previously a longtime freelancer and radio talk show host. Jamila has over 20 years of experience at news organizations, including NPR, Viacom/BET, and The Washington Post, and her work has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and NPR.
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Sylvia A. Harvey is a journalist, speaker, and the author of The Shadow System: Mass Incarceration and the American Family. SAH's work has appeared in The Nation, Elle, Politico, Vox, The Marshall Project, Colorlines, and more. NPR, WBAI, HuffPost Live, Cheddar News, and others, have featured her commentary. Her work is being used in university coursework and has been cited by federal lawmakers.
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Jaeah Lee is a contributing writer at The New York Times Magazine and a 2021-2022 Knight-Wallace Reporting Fellow. She has written for numerous publications and is a recipient of the American Mosaic Journalism Prize, served as a board member for the Asian American Journalists Association's San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, and was a contributing editor for PEN America’s The Sentences That Create Us.
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Valeria is a Phoenix-based investigative journalist and managing editor of palabra.. She has produced documentaries for Discovery Spanish, CNN Español, and PBS. Her work can be found in The Guardian, California Sunday Magazine, Latino USA and the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting. She won the American Mosaic Journalism Prize, and as a 2021 Nieman Visiting Fellow, created the podcast Comadres al Aire.
IIJ Advisory Board
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Benét J. Wilson is director of the Poynter-Koch Media and Journalism Fellowship, a year-long program for early-career journalists. She was previously a senior editor and a travel/aviation writer for The Points Guy. She serves on the board of Mercer University’s Center for Collaborative Journalism and has served on the Online News Association and the National Association of Black Journalists boards. She is a strong advocate for media diversity, mentoring and career navigation.
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Doug Mitchell is the Founder and Director of Next Generation Radio, an audio-focused multimedia program produced at various locations around the US. It is a five-day "sprint" where 5-6 applicants are selected, paired 1:1 with a professional journalist and those teams report a 3:30-4:00 minute, non-narrated audio piece with a concurrent multimedia package. As Next Gen begins its 24th year, it has more than 450 alumni, of which 80% identify as women and more than 70% are BIPOC.
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Deborah D. Douglas is director of the newly created Midwest Solutions Journalism Hub and a senior lecturer at Northwestern University. She is a founding co-editor in chief of The Emancipator, a digital platform that reimagines abolitionist newspapers for a new day. She previously served as the Eugene S. Pulliam Distinguished Visiting Professor at DePauw University, senior leader with The OpEd Project, amplifying underrepresented expert voices, and founding managing editor of MLK50: Justice Through Journalism. Douglas is author of the “U.S. Civil Rights Trail: A Traveler’s Guide to the People, Places, and Events That Made the Movement,” the first-ever travel guide to follow the official civil rights trail in the South.
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Paul Cheung is a mission-focused leader dedicated to driving innovation and progress in the media industry. With over 20 years of experience, he has spearheaded transformative initiatives focused on technology adoption, combating misinformation, ensuring business sustainability, and fostering organizational culture change. As the Strategic Advisor for Hacks/Hackers, Paul Cheung leads the development and execution of strategies that promote the adoption of emerging technologies like AI within the media industry. His responsibilities include strategizing, designing programs, fundraising and forging partnerships to seamlessly integrate advanced technologies across the media landscape. Previously, Cheung held key leadership roles at notable organizations including the Center for Public Integrity, Knight Foundation, NBC News Digital, The Associated Press, The Miami Herald, and The Wall Street Journal. His work has been crucial in developing innovative models and partnerships that have greatly diversified news organizations and enhanced their sustainability.
The IIJ Team
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Founder and Chief Executive Officer
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Katherine is a science journalist and author based in the Washington, D.C. area who writes about education, equity, mental health, parenting, journalism, and social justice for publications including The Atlantic, The New York Times, Nieman Reports, Parents, and The Washington Post. Her 2018 book The Good News About Bad Behavior grew out of Mother Jones’ most-read article. A biracial woman (Asian American and White), she previously worked as a national correspondent for Newhouse News Service and Bloomberg News.
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Editorial Director
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Ann Marie Awad is an independent journalist with 15 years of experience in the news business. As a host and reporter in public radio newsrooms across three different states, their work has also aired nationally on NPR and Here & Now. Ann Marie has produced, edited and consulted on podcast projects with clients including Audible, SONOS and WAMU.
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Operations Director
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Katie Spillman is an operations, project, and administrative professional with over 15 years of experience working with start-ups, non-profits, foundations, and social impact firms to improve and create operational systems and maintain administrative efficiency. She enjoys using her skills to support NGOs addressing some of the world’s biggest challenges such as climate justice, racial equity, and poverty. Katie graduated from The New School with an M.A. in Media Management.
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Editorial Assistant
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Hailey Wong is a second-year student at CUNY Baruch College pursuing a Bachelor’s of Business Administration degree in Accounting. She is passionate about learning and activism.
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Editorial Assistant
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Malaya Cruz-Hubbard is a student at Washington University in St. Louis studying the intersection of neuroscience, philosophy and psychology. She aims to promote equity and access of resources across diverse communities.
The Institute for Independent Journalists is growing! We’d love to hear from potential partners, collaborators or others who are interested in working with us to support financial and emotional sustainability for independent journalists.
We periodically add part-time staff to our team. Interested applicants should send their resume and a cover letter outlining their skills, experience and why you're interested in a role at the IIJ to Info@TheIIJ.com. Please put "applicant" in the subject line. We’ll respond when we have new projects to be completed!
FAQ
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Yes! All sessions will be recorded except for networking events. Register here and you'll receive access to the recordings until March 31. Look for an email on Tuesday, March 5 with instructions on how to view recorded sessions. It will come from the email address info@theiij.com
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The institute serves freelance writers, reporters, photographers, videographers, graphic designers, data journalists, and all other creators who use the tools of journalism to inform the public. We prioritize journalists of color but also include White journalists in many of our programs.
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There are so many amazing journalism nonprofits, professional associations, and membership organizations. We support and belong to many of them! However, there's no group that exclusively serves independent journalists (aka freelancers) and also centers racial diversity and the most marginalized voices. We aim to fill that role and collaborate with existing groups.
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We are funded by personal savings, philanthropic support, event registration, and sponsorships.
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The Institute for Independent Journalists , LLC is a Maryland limited-liability company operating as The IIJ Foundation, a project of Players Philanthropy Fund, Inc., a Texas nonprofit corporation recognized by IRS as a tax-exempt public charity under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code (Federal Tax ID: 27-6601178, ppf.org/pp). Contributions to The IIJ Foundation qualify as tax-deductible to the fullest extent of the law.
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The IIJ develops products, tools, and curricula for independent journalists and creators, including an annual conference. The IIJ Foundation is the nonprofit arm of the IIJ, offering free programming and community to support freelancers of color.
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We'd love to include you in our future programming! If you're a freelancer interested in volunteering, or if you'd like your institution to explore partnering, supporting or sponsoring the institute, email Info@theIIJ.com. And definitely sign up for our email list!
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We aim to keep the conference registration fee very low in order that as many people can attend as possible. The sooner you register, the lower your cost will be. Unfortunately, due to restrictions in our fiscal sponsorship arrangement, we will be unable to offer scholarships to the conference.
If you’d like to partner with us to help make the conference free for some attendees, email Katherine@theiij.com and perhaps we can make that happen!
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The IIJ's focus is to support journalists of color, including Alaska Native, American Indian, Asian American, Black, Indigenous, Latine, Middle Eastern, North African and Pacific Islander. White participants are welcome at our conference and webinars. We just ask people to please be aware of their positionality, let others speak, and stay out of affinity spaces. For example, if there is a breakout group for Black or Asian American or Latine participants, don't join that breakout room. If there's an opportunity limited to BIPOC journalists, don't seek that opportunity.
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We will honor requests for refunds received within three days of purchase. After that time, all purchases are nonrefundable because digital bonuses are delivered. Conference recordings will be available for one month after the event, so even if your plans change, you will be able to access the material.
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Membership is free with your registration to the IIJ conference.
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We will send instructions out in the newsletter on Tuesday, March 5 explaining how to access and view conference recordings and the resources for each session, including contact information for panelists who are willing to share it. We will provide edited chats as soon as possible, once sensitive or personal information is removed.
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To honor the labor of the organizers and participants in the IIJ 2024 conference, we are providing session recordings to view until March 31. Moreover, we believe there's so much value in these recordings that you won't want to wait! We all know how journalists are motivated by deadlines.
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We offered the conference at a tremendous discount, compared with similar online workshops and events for journalists. The recordings and resources from each session are available for a full month after the conference.