Little Rock Public Radio will deepen its engagement with communities across central Arkansas this year by partnering with other public radio stations across the country in an initiative called America Amplified Election 2024.
The initiative is hosted by WFYI in Indianapolis and is funded by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to support community engagement journalism in traditionally underserved areas. The initiative builds on a similar project in 2022 to help public media stations provide critical information about voting during the midterm elections.
America Amplified prioritizes meaningful in-person and online engagement in order to build trust, expand audiences and deepen the impact of public media journalism. In 2024, Little Rock Public Radio will use community engagement journalism practices to combat the spread of misinformation and distrust in media while also sharing audience-focused resources on voting information.
Through this initiative, Little Rock Public Radio aims to put people, not preconceived ideas, at the center of its reporting process. The station will receive training and coaching to map an effective strategy for serving their community, using the Hearken platform to discover what information their broader communities need to confidently participate in the 2024 general election. Specifically, Little Rock Public Radio aims to reach out to new, college-age voters as well as recent immigrants to the central Arkansas area.
America Amplified’s goal is to create and share models of community engagement success to inform and strengthen future local, regional and national journalism.
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Editor’s note: In responding to questions from our audience and community generated by the Hearken platform, LRPR will be using an Election Information Portal, developed by America Amplified in partnership with a data and analytics company. This tool uses generative AI to gather verified information from state election offices to respond to questions posed by their audience and community. Responses will be drafted using, in part, the information gathered by the GAI tool. They will be edited, revised and verified by American Ampilfied and newsroom staff.