Committed to diversity

Charlotte Hall saw a community changing and knew the newspaper would have to change, too

By Arlene Notoro Morgan

Charlotte Hall, 55, has been managing editor of Newsday since 1997. As one of three managing editors, she oversees the news operation, including the National, State, Foreign, Long Island and Queens desks, as well as the Photo and Art and Design departments.

Hall joined Newsday in 1981 after the Washington Star folded and held a variety of editing jobs, from copy chief to Washington news editor to Long Island editor. She left the newsroom for two years to serve as the paper’s marketing director, running circulation marketing, NIE and the research department, an experience Hall called “enriching.”

Hall said her best career move is when she dropped out of a Ph.D. program in English literature to join the real world as a reporter for the Ridgewood (N.J.) Newspapers. Her first feature was an interview with Sid Caesar, and her first series dealt with the water supply in northern New Jersey. When she applied to the Bergen Record as a reporter, they turned her into a copy editor because she aced a grammar test. After Bergen, she went on to the Boston Herald American and then the Star.

She is a graduate of Kalamazoo College in Michigan, of which she is now a trustee, and received a master’s in English from the University of Chicago.

Hall has been a member of ASNE since 1997. She has served on a number of committees and has been most active on the Diversity Committee, which she chaired in 2000-01.

In June 2000 Hall represented Newsday when it was recognized as “newspaper of the year” for diversity by the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism’s “Let’s Do It Better” program.

Sig Gissler, founder of the program, cited Newsday and Hall’s leadership for the paper’s consistent attention to serving a diverse population and for leading the paper to a 22 percent minority staff rate.

Q. You led the ASNE Diversity Committee during an intense period devoted to promoting new programs. Can you explain these programs and think ahead a few years to discuss what you hope they will accomplish?

A. Two major programs started this past year: first, the ASNE/APME Fellows Program, funded and administered by The Freedom Forum. This $1 million program is aimed at placing beginning journalists, up to 50 a year, at papers under 75,000 circulation. The journalists receive two-year stipends of $20,000 and professional support and career coaching from The Freedom Forum. Second, the ASNE High School Journalism Initiative, funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and overseen by ASNE’s Education for Journalism Committee, aims to strengthen high school journalism and the pipeline of young journalists through partnerships with newspapers, a comprehensive Web site and training of newspaper advisers.

Q. Newsday has been honored for its commitment to diversity, both in content and hiring. Why do you think Newsday “gets it” while other newspapers are still struggling on this issue?

A. Diversity at Newsday remains a work in progress, and we still need to work on it every day. Some departments are a lot farther along than others, and the top of the paper needs to become more diverse. Our coverage of diverse communities and the ordinary lives of people of color has improved, but it’s a long road. All that said, diversity has become ingrained in our culture and is perceived, I believe, as a journalistic imperative. Diversity in hiring and content is written into every manager’s goals, and every desk is responsible for an annual content audit. It has been driven from the top and championed by many strong people in our newsroom. It has also been supported by a commitment of resources to recruiting, training programs such as METPRO and our Job Opportunity Conference.

Q. Can you name the three most important things an editor can do to develop a newspaper that promotes a diverse vision?

A. Have a vision with specific goals, articulate the vision clearly and repeatedly to your staff and commit resources year after year to move toward your goal.

Q. Did you ever have an “ah ha!” moment that influenced your commitment to diversity issues?

A. Two, actually. No. 1: As part of a series on segregation about 10 years ago, we interviewed, Studs Terkel-style, scores of African Americans. One night, I sat down at my computer and read straight through all the raw interviews. What a powerful eye-opener! It wasn’t exactly St. Paul’s vision on the road to Damascus, but the reporting for that series, as well as long conversations with series’ editor Joye Brown, was transformational. No. 2: After New York Newsday folded in 1995, I was in marketing and was charged with doing a demographic analysis for our new strategic plan. Long Island, once a nearly lily white suburb, was expected to be 40 percent people of color by 2020. And our readership was lower among minority communities. A chilling thought to a marketer. And a wake-up call to an editor. For whom were we writing and whose lives were we portraying?

Q. What policies did Newsday enact to attract minority reporters?

A. Two principles underlie our efforts: recruitment and training. Vigorous recruitment, with a full-time recruiter, is the starting point. Of course, just having a recruiter doesn’t guarantee a diverse newsroom. We’ve told the AMEs it’s their responsibility to make diversity a priority. It’s their job, along with their editors, to be constantly on the lookout for talent, to attend minority journalist conventions and to build networks. A commitment to training inexperienced journalists is the second leg. We’ve been an enthusiastic sponsor and participant in the METPRO (Minority Editorial Training Program) since Times Mirror started it more than a decade ago. In fact, the copy editing training for all the papers in Times Mirror, and now Tribune, goes on in our newsroom. When I got to the paper 20 years ago, two people of color sat on our copy desk; today more than 40 percent of the copy desk is nonwhite. In addition, we started our own two-year training program for local reporters and photographers, with a couple of candidates added each year. While it is not a minority-training program per se, we emphasize diversity. And we use our large summer internship program to “pre-qualify” future hires, keeping them in our network as they pass through smaller papers.

Last, diversity breeds diversity. We’ve found that recruitment and retention have improved as our diversity increases. People want to work where they see people like themselves—and where they find a rich mix of other backgrounds too. It’s more fun, more exciting, more challenging.

Q. The Newsday Jobs Opportunity Conference is a must for editors who are looking for young talent. How did this job fair start and why do you think job fairs work?

A. We’ve been doing the job fair for 18 years, and it succeeds because of the quality of candidates it attracts, many of them young journalists who have finally realized that they’re going to have to leave New York City to get their first job. That’s why papers from all over the country come to recruit — they find qualified candidates. Ten people got jobs at our recent conference.

Q. You are doing some interesting programs at the high school level and with NIE. Can you explain these programs and tell editors how they can adapt them?

A. I’ll mention several. We hold workshops for high school journalism teachers and, separately, for their students, using our own photographers, graphic artists and editors to show them how to make their papers better. We do it in collaboration with NIE. On another front we have a Girl Scout program that provides scout “patches” for studying journalism through Newsday. This involves visits to our paper and a Chip Tracer (our cyber-journalist comic book character) curriculum that includes use of the newspaper. The newspapers count as NIE circulation. And there’s our NIE high school journalism writing competition for high school journalists, with various categories and an awards ceremony at Newsday. Newsday staff people also work with AAJA and NYABJ on their high school journalism programs in the New York area.

Q. As a woman who has managed to reach a high level at a major newspaper, what advice do you have for women who aspire to the same objective?

A. 1. Think well of yourself. 2. Take risks — try new stuff. 3. Speak up —don’t assume you’ll be promoted just because you know you’ve done a great job. The riskiest things I’ve done — go off to marketing for a couple years, dump a secure job at the rich Record for a bigger title at the wobbly Boston Herald American — turned out the best. I’m still learning all three lessons.

Q. What obstacles did you have to overcome?

A. Well, let’s see. There was the copy editor who told me he liked broads in blue jeans after I wore Levis to the office in a snowstorm; the news editor who told me to get out of my Celtics’ warm-up suit (a green pants suit) and look like a woman; the high-ranking editor who told me he understood the biologic necessity of my motherhood and therefore was changing my assignment. That was the easy stuff. Much harder was the overwhelmingly male culture that has trouble seeing women as leaders. I will say that along the way, wonderful editors supported me, taught me and championed my aspirations. All of them were men.

Q. We hear a great deal about the “glass ceiling” women face in this business. Do you think that ceiling will last much longer, given the number of young women who are journalists?

A. I’m guardedly optimistic about the business. Despite recent strides, I still don’t see the numbers of women making it to the top that their presence in the ranks would predict. I’ve grown tired of hearing that it’s a generational thing — that talented women will flow upward over time as more are fed into the system. Well, women have been in newsrooms in large numbers for three decades, and while upward movement is occurring, the pace is too slow. I still occasionally attend meetings where I’m the only woman in the room. One positive is the growing network of terrific female editors who are helping each other. But I won’t be satisfied until the upper ranks reflect society, both in gender and ethnic makeup. That means half women.

Q. With so much change going on in the news business, what would you tell a young journalist to inspire her about why you remain committed to it?

A. I would say to her that newspapers are still the best place to do serious journalism. That serious journalism matters more now than ever. That in an age of distressingly bland national media, good local newspapers continue to speak to their communities with feisty and independent voices. And that it’s still a lot of fun.

Q. Are you seeing the impact of the multi-media presentation ideas now that Newsday is part of the Tribune company?

A. Yeah, when they started stringing fiber optic cable in the newsroom, I knew something was up. Actually, we were seeing a step-up even before Tribune bought us, with our website and nascent cable TV presence, but it’s definitely accelerated and we’re really excited about it. We’re putting a camera in the newsroom, we’re adding a multimedia editor and we’re actively working on partnerships with the Tribune-owned television station in New York (WB11), Cablevision, and the largest radio station on Long Island. It’s been energizing and fun for the newsroom.

Q. Who is your role model and how did that person help you?

A. I deeply admire Alicia Patterson, who founded Newsday in 1940. At once daring and insecure, elegant and earthy, intellectually sophisticated and folksy, she provided the drive and vision that built Newsday into a journalistic juggernaut. Despite her wealth and talents, she struggled with life — a never-ending quest to prove herself to her father, Joseph Medill Patterson, three rocky marriages, a hidden love affair with Adlai Stevenson, terrible health problems and an early death. Her passion for journalism and for the community imbue the paper to this day. And she knew a great truth we should all learn better: serve your readers, but never bore them. “I want people to pick up Newsday saying to themselves, I wonder what that damn paper is saying today,’’ she said.

Q. What type of leadership role does Newsday play in the community?

A. We are a major player in our community on many fronts, not all of them journalistic. We’re one of the largest private employers. We’re also the largest advertising vehicle on Long Island and are responsible for the success of many businesses. As a company, we support many charitable and civic groups. Our publisher and his wife have a high profile in several organizations. Our editorial page is a powerful voice on many local issues. In the past year, for example, it was instrumental in forging a solution to Nassau County’s financial crisis. As a newsgathering organization, we are the only local daily for an island of 2.7 million people, and that means we have tremendous influence on the civic life of our communities. Long Island is a conglomeration of disparate and distinct communities, with no island-wide government unit or institution tying them together. So in many ways, we are the voice of Long Island. We both reflect the Island and define what is news.

Q. Do you think there are tangible results from the community outreach programs or civic journalism forums that many newspapers use?

A. I don’t feel comfortable with public journalism as it’s been defined in recent years. I don’t think newspapers should convene the community with an agenda in mind. Newspapers should cover the news and reveal the news so that communities can make their own decisions. We should speak with readers and openly seek their views, but we should not pose solutions in public forums. We get into the community regularly to meet our readers and hear their concerns. I love to talk with readers face to face at these forums because I like to know what they think of us and I always get good story ideas. But as a news gatherer, I wouldn’t begin to tell our communities how to run their affairs.

Q. When you look back over your career, what makes you most proud to be a journalist?

A. Doing journalism that matters: documenting racial disparities in medical care, explaining breast cancer to fearful Long Islanders, proving that some brands of apple juice were adulterated, taking apart a slumlord’s empire, unmasking an adoption scam, revealing the horrors of child soldiers around the world.

What’s most rewarding about newspaper journalism is the fact that we still live an honest and useful life, despite the increasing financial pressures and the entertainment values that permeate the media. And the fact is we can come to work every day and believe that at heart we are doing something of service to our readers and our communities.

Q. What is the most fun part of what you do?

A. The big story — when the big one breaks, there’s no better place to be in America than a newspaper newsroom.

Morgan is director of workshops on journalism, race and ethnicity at Columbia University.