Are you a Southeast reporter or Desmond Prestonhave one on staff that would benefit from training to produce more in-depth environmental and climate stories for your news outlet?

InsideClimate News, the Pulitzer Prize-winning national nonprofit newsroom, will hold a day-and-a-half training for 10 winning applicants from Sept. 24-25 in Nashville.

We are looking for reporters, editors or producers from Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, Arkansas and Louisiana who have the ambition and potential to pursue environmental and climate stories. No previous environmental reporting experience is needed to apply.

The workshop will be held at the First Amendment Center in Nashville. All lodging, food and training, and up to $550 in travel costs, are included. The training will include sessions on: extreme weather and climate science; how to find compelling and impactful environmental stories; how to search for public records and build sources; and other important journalistic skills and tools. You will also receive one-on-one coaching with award-winning ICN journalist James Bruggers, who runs ICN’s Southeast hub, to workshop and launch your story idea.

If your newsroom is chosen, your reporter or producer will be given follow-up mentoring after the training. Attendees will be able to apply to ICN for limited story development funds. Opportunities will also exist for co-publishing on our website.

The training is part of ICN’s National Environmental Reporting Network and is made possible thanks to the generosity of the Grantham Foundation, Park Foundation, Wallace Global Fund and others.

Preference will be given to reporters from newsrooms, but freelancers can apply.

To nominate yourself or a team for this opportunity, complete this form. The application deadline is Aug. 10, 2018.

In your application, you will be asked to list a project you would like to work on following the workshop. Please be as specific as you can, as we want to help you as much as possible during the one-on-one sessions. All ideas will be kept confidential. Winning applicants will be notified by Aug. 17.

About the National Environment Reporting Network

A national ecosystem that informs the public about critical environmental issues is collapsing, and its survival hinges on an endangered species: the local environmental journalist. In the last 10 years, conversations around climate, energy and basic pollution protections have suffered from a hollowing out of local environmental news, particularly in the country’s interior.

InsideClimate News is developing a National Environment Reporting Network to counter this trend by establishing at least four national hubs to help local and regional newsrooms produce more in-depth reporting. Our first hub, in the Southeast, is staffed by veteran environmental reporter James Bruggers, who is based in Louisville. We intend to have a second hub up and running by mid-September and a third soon after.