The Center for Investigative Reporting has been awarded a $900,000 grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation to expand its reporting on inequities related to race, gender and economics that affect working families and launch a fellowship for journalists of color. The three-year grant also will support academic research into workplace disparities and create opportunities for public engagement, including through the production of two original one-act plays by CIR’s StoryWorks.
“The Kellogg Foundation has long invested in projects that address unfairness in our society, and we are grateful for their support of our work,” said CIR Chief Executive Officer Joaquin Alvarado. “This grant aligns with our efforts to illuminate the injustices that lock working families into poverty and will help us expand our coverage of barriers to equal opportunity for everyone.”
“I am thrilled by the opportunities this generous grant offers us to deepen our reporting of the working world and identify solutions to entrenched discrimination and abuse that disproportionately affect vulnerable communities,” said CIR Editor in Chief Amy Pyle. “I also look forward to increasing the diversity of voices in our own field by mentoring emerging investigative journalists of color through this new fellowship program.”
“The Kellogg Foundation is proud to support The Center for Investigative Reporting and its working world series,” said Carla D. Thompson, vice president for program strategy at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. “The employment world is changing, and CIR’s work will help community leaders and policymakers identify workplace protections, including dismantling racial barriers and discrimination, to help working parents better provide for their children.”
About WKKF
The W.K. Kellogg Foundation (WKKF), founded in 1930 as an independent, private foundation by breakfast cereal pioneer Will Keith Kellogg, is among the largest philanthropic foundations in the United States. Guided by the belief that all children should have an equal opportunity to thrive, WKKF works with communities to create conditions for vulnerable children so they can realize their full potential in school, work and life.
The Kellogg Foundation is based in Battle Creek, Michigan, and works throughout the United States and internationally, as well as with sovereign tribes. Special emphasis is paid to priority places where there are high concentrations of poverty and where children face significant barriers to success. WKKF priority places in the U.S. are in Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico and New Orleans and internationally are in Mexico and Haiti. For more information, visit www.wkkf.org.
About CIR
Founded in 1977, The Center for Investigative Reporting is the nation’s first independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization dedicated to public service journalism. CIR empowers the public through groundbreaking investigative storytelling that sparks action, improves lives and protects our democracy. The stories CIR tells hold the powerful accountable and uncover information that would otherwise remain hidden from the public – revealing injustices, exposing threats to public safety, protecting vulnerable communities, championing human rights, speaking out against environmental degradation and shining a light on government fraud and waste of taxpayer funds. CIR’s reporting also exposes the intersection of power, money and politics and the impact of failures of accountability for vulnerable populations and underserved communities. CIR is the recipient of the prestigious MacArthur Award for Creative and Effective Institutions, winner of 2013 and 2015 Emmy Awards and a 2013 George Foster Peabody Award, and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2012 (for local reporting) and 2013 (for public service).
To learn more, contact Annie Chabel at achabel@cironline.org or visit revealnews.org. Find and follow Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting on Twitter and Facebook.