Discrimination Dominates Occupation That Reports on Discrimination

Newspapers often run stories about local and national diversity-related issues, but it’s within newsrooms across America where these issues seem to lie.

One-third of the U.S. population consists of people of color, but as of 2007, at least 392 newspapers had no minorities at all on their staffs, according to the article "Newsroom Numbers: Good and Bad."

Dori Maynard, president of the Maynard Institute for Journalism Education and a board member of the Sigma Delta Chi Foundation, thinks newsroom managers should put as much effort into ensuring a diverse staff as they do coming up with creative story ideas.

"If we don't see much diversity of race and ethnicity in our personal lives," Maynard said. "it may be harder to take in our responsibilities to an increasingly mixed society."

Newsrooms Need Culture Shock

Many media researchers have identified what they consider a white-centered bias in the news, and according to experimental psychologists and human resources experts, hiring and promotion procedures may in fact "shut people out."

• The number of journalists of color within participating newsrooms has consistently stayed at approximately 13 percent for the past few years
• This percentage decreased in 2006
• Sixteen percent of online newspaper journalists are of color

The American Society of Newspaper Editors compiled these statistics.

Doomed Future?

Decreased circulation, increased publication costs and dwindled newsroom staffs have become the forefront problems facing newspaper companies today, but are managers really giving readers what they want?

"You're not going to grow your readership if you dismiss 30 percent of the population," Maynard said. "It just won't work."

Maybe, as an industry, we think that good intentions can make up for quantity, he said.

"An inclusive newsroom environment led to improved quantity and quality in news coverage of minorities," according to a recent study by researchers Ted Pease of Utah State University, Erna Smith of San Francisco State University and Federico Subervi of Texas State University-San Marcos.

Journalists can shift newsroom culture to reflect social reality if the right measures are taken.