Alisa Barba: America Amplified has been around since 2019. We are funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and our original, I think, mission or goal was basically, working with, again, public media stations across the country prior to the 2020 election. I think coming off the 2016 election and Donald Trump's ascent into office, I think there was a sense that we really needed to understand America better. So, the CPB funded an initiative to really try to deepen community engagement across public media. Which means making sure that public media stations had a really much better sense of kind of who was in their community and what they were thinking. Of course, that the 2019 initiative for the 2020 election, you know, ran right into the pandemic, of course, where in-person engagement was severely curtailed. But like everybody else, we pivoted and became much more of a kind of a information source for a lot of COVID questions. So that was our first iteration. Now in 2024, we are dedicated still to this idea of deepening community engagement for public media. We're working with over 50 public media stations. When I say public media, I mean both. public radio and public TV across the country, training and coaching them to identify a community that they have underserved in the past, that they really want to reach, giving them some skills and some tools to learn how to engage with that community and understand, assess what that community's information needs are. What do they need to know? The idea in the end is that public media will help these communities get the information they need to confidently participate in the upcoming election. That is what we're working on all across the country.
Patrick Center: We are working with you on this project as a partner. Oftentimes when you launch a program like this and it's ambitious, you want that feedback. What kind of feedback have you been receiving since you have a pretty good sample size at this point? What have you been hearing from people in communities engaging with America Amplified?
Alisa Barba: Well, again, the communities are engaging with their local stations. And I think what we're seeing, we're in the early stages, of course, but what we're seeing is there's a sense of, oh, wow, you're there to answer my question. Or, you know, thank you for asking this sense of as interaction is really beginning between stations and their audiences and communities. I think that there's a sense of gratitude that the stations are looking to their communities for questions and are offering their communities answers. As I said, we're very early in the stage, but I'll give you an example of a station in Salt Lake City that decided to put a question out there to their audience, which is what issues should we be covering during this current legislative session? Their legislature was in session for six weeks or so at the beginning part of the year. And so, they put that prompt out there and they got dozens and dozens and dozens of people responding saying, we want you to cover this, we want you to cover this. And it was really, I think fascinating for the station to understand where their audience was. And I think for the audience, it was they were grateful that the station was asking, frankly, for their feedback.
Patrick Center: Big picture, is this democracy from the ground up? How do you describe it?
Alisa Barba: Oh, interesting. We actually had a series last year when we were working for the 2022 election that we called Democracy from the Ground Up and we had station reporters across the country look for those people on the ground who are building democracy. So that was last year. I think that empowering people with the information they need to confidently participate in the election, I definitely would call that democracy from the ground up. That's building civic infrastructure and building civic muscle to create a stronger democracy for sure.
Patrick Center: As we're entering into this election cycle, how important is this just emotionally, psychologically? There are so many issues voters are confronted with, it's a heavy lift for people to wade through all of this.
Alisa Barba: Yeah, I think that's true. I think personally from the experience that I'm working with a specific group of stations that are reaching out to young people and are looking to reach young audiences. And what we're finding is that there's a tremendous eagerness to talk about these issues, to understand these issues that young people, you know, we're talking 18 to you know, maybe 30 years old, that they are very engaged and they are very interested. Now, of course, not all across the board, and I'm sure, you know, many in your listening audience will say, well, I'm not interested, I'm not engaged. But there are a lot of people, there's a lot of topics that get people going these days and they do want to talk about it. I think, you know, here it's March, we don't know where we're going to be come October or November. We certainly see the campaigning all around us. But I think one of the big messages that we're trying to get out there is that it's not all about the national election. It's not all about who's going to be president. It's also about what's going on in your local elections. What about your local judges? What about your city council? What about your school board? These are all things that individuals can have some impact on those races. And those are the really important ones, I think, for public media stations to pay attention to.
Patrick Center: Local truly matters and that's why we're all in this because we know the value of providing news and information to our local audiences. It's also really about trust. It's having that trust.
Alisa Barba: Well, you know, these days where the media landscape is so vast and fractured. Where are you going to get the information that you can trust? As you say, the information that has been vetted, that has been cleared, that has been edited, and that we know is truthful. And you have to know where those sources are because, you know, one man's facts is another man's lies these days. So, I think really important underlying mission for this initiative is to establish public media across the country as a trusted place to get the information that you need and that you're looking for.
Patrick Center: If you could describe this tool that we will also be using, it's called Hearken. And we plan to embed it on a number of platforms with WGVU and some of our partners. This is a place where listeners can come, viewers can come along and ask questions. How valuable is this tool?
Alisa Barba: Asking questions and getting answers. It's just absolutely fundamental way to begin conversations. I think from the station's point of view, trying to understand what questions their audience and their community has is a critical step towards meeting those information needs. I think from the audience point of view, to know that you can ask a question, even a question as simple as what is the deadline to register to vote? Now we all know you could go online and you can Google that and you could probably get a good answer. But if you have a question like that and you can ask your public media station, you know, what's the deadline to register for vote? And you can get an answer back quickly, efficiently, and accurately. That's a great service.
Patrick Center: What I like most about this, not only does the listener, the viewer get an answer, but there are questions that can be generated. There could be some very unique questions that as journalists we don't think about but are truly important in somebody's life.
Alisa Barba: Right, I think that's absolutely true. There are always questions that come in. We've been doing this for a couple of different election rounds here. There are questions that come in that you never thought of and that are absolutely, you know, great questions. And what we do with those questions at America Amplified, we're kind of the backup. We will answer the questions and then we'll run that answer past you, Patrick, for your audience to make sure that it, you know, has the context that you would like for that answer. But oftentimes, the questions that come in will spur stories, so that you'll end up going and saying, oh, that's a really good question. Then you'll go out and report that story out and produce a feature for your station based on your audience's question.
Patrick Center: And that's why we want participation. And that's why the questions are so valuable.
Alisa Barba: Exactly, and asking people, you know, what do you want to hear? I mean, the other thing that we're trying to do is we're trying to change up the way public media covers elections. So, it's less of a, what did this poll say and who's ahead here and who's ahead there? And as you know, that's particularly important in Michigan which is a critical swing state. But instead of covering it like a horse race, we're encouraging public media stations to take much more of what is called a citizens agenda approach. Understand what issues are driving your audience? What do they care most about? And then put those questions before the local candidates to say, where do you come down on climate change? Or where do you come down on books and schools? All of these issues that are really local and really important. This initiative is aimed at the 2024 election, but it's really, it's a much bigger piece of helping your station become better connected with the audience that you serve, understanding the better, building trust, building a relationship that hopefully will last long beyond November.
Patrick Center: Alisa Barba, you are the managing editor for America Amplified. Thank you so much.
Alisa Barba: Thank you, Patrick.
Patrick Center: If you have an election question – or questions – you’d like answered, we invite you to engage with us and America Amplified. Simply go to the WGVUNEWS.org main page https://www.wgvunews.org/ or WGVU.org politics page https://www.wgvu.org/politics/. There you’ll see the Hearken tool asking, “What information would be helpful to you leading into the 2024 election?” You can customize your question to location providing the most accurate answer. Follow the prompts and submit your question. You’ll receive an answer – and – if it’s one impacting communities our journalists will investigate.