Public Health Challenges, Events & Funding

Here's a web resource to help strengthen and diversify the funding bases of community groups. "Promising Practices in Revenue Generation" addresses these questions:
• How can we raise more money?
• What attitudes contribute to succeed grassroots fundraising?
• What staff skills are needed to increase income?
• What types of fundraising do highly effective organizations focus on?
• When is government funding useful? When is it risky?

Sound Partners encourages and supports stations and community partners in sustaining their projects beyond their initial roles in Sound Partners. Take a look at our Funding Tools and Opportunities Toolkit to find links for grant-writing, funding deadlines and on-line resources for continuing your important work.

The competition is tough, the projects innovative and the impact and results will be watched far and wide. New Voices funds 10 hyperlocal citizen media projects annually with $12,000 in first-year funding from J-Lab. Follow progress and find application information on-line.
Deadline February 8, 2006

The Association of Health Care Journalists (AHCJ) honors excellence in health care reporting. Reporters from radio and TV may submit as many entries as they would like, but no entry can have more than three authors. First place award is $500, plus travel expenses to the annual conference. Certificates will be awarded for second place and honorable mention. Entry fee: $40 AHCJ members, $60 non-members. Categories, entry forms and FAQs on the Web site.
QUICK Deadline: January 6, 2006

January is a big month for journalism award submissions. Here's a list of nearly one dozen fine awards for which Sound Partners programming is a good match! The Polk, Peabody and RFKennedy deadlines are this month. Check out the fellowships and internships, too. Remember, you can't win if you don't play!

The National Center for Outreach (NCO) Community Leadership Summit Grants are designed to help PBS stations better understand and serve their communities by convening day-long Community Summits. The Summit is a vehicle for listening and exchanging ideas that might lead to new collaborative initiatives. It is a one-day meeting structured to give voice to concerns about your community. The hope is that the day's ideas will lead to partnership opportunities and create possible steps to address identified community concerns. NCO offers $2000 in funding for 12 projects.
Grant guidelines and application forms are online as pdf or MSWord files.

The competition is tough, the projects innovative and the impact and results will be watched far and wide. New Voices funds 10 hyperlocal citizen media projects annually with $12,000 in first-year funding from J-Lab. Follow progress and find application information on-line.

The fourth annual health communication conference will be co-sponsored by the American College of Physicians Foundation, the National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine in Washington, DC on November 30, 2005. "Practical Solutions to the Problems of Low Health Literacy" will convene top experts in the fields of health literacy and health communication, as well as leaders from organizations and industries that are stakeholders in health literacy, including public and professional education, the business community, the insurance sector, and government and nonprofit organizations. The conference will focus on successful operational models that have been shown to improve health outcomes among patients with low incomes. Registration is just $45. Complete information is available online.
Date: November 30, 2005

Applications are being accepted for the 2006 Fellowship program designed to "help journalists and commentators do the best possible job of keeping the public informed about health issues at this critical time in the evolution of our health care system." Fellows will have the option of undertaking a project for up to nine months—but shorter fellowship projects will now be possible, with a minimum one-month research/reporting project. Successful fellows will complete at least one individually designed research project or field practicum, meet regularly with other Kaiser media fellows and with a range of leading experts, policymakers, journalists, and others in the health field and participate in the 4-5 program site visits over the course of their fellowship year. Stipends of up to $50,000 (nine month projects) plus expenses will be offered to up to ten fellows. Complete details, eligibility and application information is available on-line.
Deadline March 16, 2006.

The Threshold Foundation funds innovative non-profit organizations working to further the causes of social justice, environmental preservation, humane economic systems and the peaceful coexistence of individuals, communities and cultures. The Strategic Media Committee is accepting Letters of Inquiry for projects that 1) Organize and advocate around media policy reforms, including: internet access, open source standards, diversity of content, low power radio work, FCC accountability, affordability and accessibility of basic services, ownership limits, community Wi-Fi, and expansion of the media commons; 2) Form new alliances and strategic partnerships to support critical coverage of media issues and public debate of media policies; 3) Offer creative approaches to fundraising and capitalization: strategies to increase resources and link progressive media policy and production from both non-profit and for-profit perspectives; 4) Leverage policy reform, amplify existing work, build the power and capacity of the media reform movement, and implement creative approaches to organizing and advocacy around media reform; and 5) Broaden the base of media activism and bring new voices to the policy debate and/or new audiences to independent media. The committee does not fund content production unless it is directly related to media reform or local TV, radio and print distribution. The Threshold Foundation will fund a few grants in the $25,000-$75,000 range and will also look at smaller projects if they are timely and compelling. Information, guidelines and application is available online.
Deadline for Letters of Inquiry is October 28, 2005 5pm.