The National Newspaper Association Foundation wants you

Dec 2, 2014

It is that charitable-giving time of the year, and the National Newspaper Association Foundation is asking members to please consider making a fully tax-deductible gift to the non-profit arm of the National Newspaper Association that does so much to help your business.

NNA created the foundation as a non-profit partner with the mission of promoting news literacy, protecting the First Amendment and enhancing the quality, role and capability of community newspapers and community journalists.

This year will be the third year that our NNAF Washington News Fellows program will bring promising college seniors and juniors who are editors of their college newspapers to our nation’s capital for a three-day, hands-on training session in how to cover complex national issues from a community perspective. You may have seen their articles in Pub Aux last May or on the NNA’s website at www.nnaweb.org.

We intentionally wait until the last possible minute to determine each year’s topic so we are assured the subject the Fellows are studying is timely and at the top of the political agenda.

Last year’s topic was on national security and government surveillance. The Fellows received their own private briefing from the National Security Agency and, on the other side of the issue, from Tom Blanton of the National Security Archive. Each class of Fellows also meets with their local congressional representatives while on Capitol Hill to discuss the issue for their subsequent news stories.

Two years ago, the issue was gun control, a topic set in the wake of the school shootings in Newtown, CT. The Fellows met with representatives from Vice President Biden’s office in the Old Executive Office Building and with parties representing those opposed to gun control, as well as members of their respective congressional delegations.

Each Fellows program also features briefings at the Newseum and at Gallup Inc. headquarters in DC, all arranged under the auspices of Nebraska Press Association Executive Director and NNAF board member Allen Beermann.

The Fellows’ mission is to detect the official spin on stories so that they will learn in their own future news writing how to spot the thin line between fact and opinion. We are excited about this program.

Teaching news literacy is an important mission of newspapers.

We also help fund the NNAF’s Newspapers in Education program in partnership with the Missouri Press Association to provide serialized fiction and lesson plans for classroom use through 400 newspapers in 19 states.

If you are interested in any of these specific programs or would like more information, please contact me at 908-647-5043 or at eparker@newjerseyhills.com. We hope you will include NNAF in your charitable giving this year. NNAF is a 501(c)(3) organization. Your gifts will be fully tax deductible.

Please mail your tax-deductible contribution to the National Newspaper Association Foundation, c/o Carol Pierce, P.O. Box 5737, Arlington, VA 22205. Or go to nnaweb.org/nnaf. We can accept major credit cards. All amounts are appreciated. No donation is too small.

Help us to continue to help you.