Charlottesville Tomorrow is a community-driven, socially conscious news organization. We serve our neighbors by connecting them to each other and to the issues that affect them most.
Our reporters dig deeply into issues that affect our community, regularly producing work that highlights issues often ignored by other media. We center our organization and news processes on our values — truth, community, and equity — and we work to improve the health of our local news community and ecosystem through our inclusive practices in hiring, journalism and partnership.
Our newsroom covers the issues that are most important in our community with a focus on race and equity and reaches a large share of our market through our free email subscriptions, news apps, social media and events.
Join our news team
Charlottesville Tomorrow seeks a reporter who is looking to do ground-level work that makes a difference to our communities. The reporter will focus on covering democracy at the local level, the ways communities are impacted by and create city and county government and agencies in central Virginia. The reporter reports to the Editor-in-Chief and works day-to-day with the Managing Editor.
We work hard to create a healthy news environment and rethink how news is produced, both for the sake of journalists doing the work and the communities we serve. While we are outlining job responsibilities and skills here, we are looking for someone who wants to join our team to help build on that culture. If you are interested, even if your experience does not match all that is listed here, please apply.
Here’s some of what this reporter will do
- Produce one to three community-focused news reports each week (subscribe to our newsletter to get a feel for what we publish)
- Work on projects and enterprise-level stories several times per year (see some examples here)
- Connect with community members regularly, in meetings and emails
- Work with the team to grow our coverage in terms of depth and breadth
- Occasionally take on other editorial tasks, including editing and social media production
- Occasionally attend events as a representative of Charlottesville Tomorrow
- Potentially take on project management or product development roles within your coverage area
- Help with the overall development and direction of a growing news organization
Here are some skills that will help
We do not expect any one candidate will have all of these skills or experiences, but here are some things we are looking for:
- Experience in journalism as a reporter who can produce both short term stories along with larger enterprise or investigative pieces
- Great news judgment and the ability to identify and pitch story ideas
- Excellent writing, with the ability to craft compelling stories that grab the reader’s attention and keep it through the story
- Fact-checking experience and value for accuracy
- Experience getting information and data from government and public agencies
- Interviewing experience and the ability to communicate with and earn the trust of people from diverse communities
- Personal or professional experience in multiple cultural settings and/or non-English language skills
- The ability to work with a diverse team, help boost colleagues and seek help when you need it
- Time management skills and the ability to understand a broad landscape and prioritize coverage
- Comfort with websites, spreadsheets and technical tools, and the ability to learn new systems
We are looking for someone who loves to take in a lot of information — from city meetings to data sets and reports — and make it accessible and useful to the people the issues affect most. This job also involves regular communication with sources throughout the city in pursuit of stories that go beyond headlines. We are seeking a reporter who prioritizes what matters to our diverse communities and can effectively cover politicians, government officials and others in positions of power.
We are seeking a reporter who thrives when trying new ways of doing things and can see beyond the limitations of traditional news coverage. We seek someone who understands that being visible, present and accountable with our community and knowledgeable about its people is core to any journalistic success. We are looking for a journalist who understands that all good work starts with being a good human being and that the future of local journalism relies on including a diversity of voices at every level.
Location
Charlottesville is a college town facing increasing home prices, education disparities, a large income gap and a reckoning with race, both separate and intertwined with the violence of the 2017 white supremacist rallies. It is a competitive and fast-changing small media market with high visibility in state and national news cycles. And it is a fast-growing, multicultural node in the region’s knowledge and finance economy. The quality of living is high, and it is a short drive from Washington D.C. and Richmond.
This is not a remote position. Our editorial team lives and works in the communities we cover, in central Virginia, and regularly spends time in our Charlottesville newsroom.
Compensation
We are building compensation packages to help create equity in the news industry. Our pay is competitive for our local area and among nonprofit news organizations around the country.
Salary Range: $50,000 to $70,000
Time off: 10 days, plus Virginia holidays and two non-publishing weeks per year
Benefits: Medical, dental and vision insurance, health savings account, retirement plan with up to 3% match
Flexible hours: We pride ourselves on building a newsroom that allows you to do work in the ways and hours that are best for you and your beat. You have the option of working from home or in the newsroom most of the time. We conduct daily meetings by video and some weekly or project meetings in person, and use Slack to communicate throughout the day.
Advancement: We invest in our reporters. You will have opportunities to develop your skills and broaden your networks through training and conferences. We support our team as they pursue fellowships and leadership programs and seek to grow as professionals.
Ready to apply?
Our application process is simple and designed to help us find candidates who will thrive in our newsroom. Please send an email to the Editor-in-Chief, Angilee Shah, at angshah [at] cvilletomorrow.org, with the subject line “Charlottesville Tomorrow Reporter.” Please include the following in your email:
- Why you are interested in working with Charlottesville Tomorrow
- The kind of journalism you’ve done and the kind you’d like to do
- Three to five links to your published work, with short descriptions of how the pieces were produced.
- Attach or include a link to your resume.
If you are interested, please send your application no later than Jan. 2, 2023. We will get back to you within two weeks of your submission about where we are in the follow-up and selection process.
