Since 1999, ONA has grown to serve a diverse, global community representing all aspects of the digital journalism industry. We are proud to celebrate 20 years of impact and identified our focus areas to guide the next 20 years of innovation and leadership in digital journalism.
We envision a journalism community that boldly innovates to better engage and inform the public. Our mission is to inspire and support innovation and excellence in digital journalism, and we will pursue it through five focus areas:
- Developing strategies for emerging technologies: We will provide insights into trends and best practices for using immersive reality, artificial intelligence and other emerging tools for journalism — supporting newsrooms to tell stories in new formats while making informed, ethical decisions for investing resources.
- Sharing best practices on audience engagement and metrics: We will support news providers in understanding how individuals engage with the information they deliver and help deepen their relationship with the communities they serve.
- Innovative news storytelling: We will continue to push the boundaries of how stories are told and how journalism inspires change.
- Experimenting and finding new revenue and business models: We will invest in more trainings and events dedicated to discovering models for thriving news ecosystems.
- Cultivating newsroom leadership, culture and diversity: We will significantly increase our efforts to ensure the industry has diverse leadership equipped to navigate uncertainty.
Over the course of developing our strategic plan, we had the opportunity to closely examine who we are as an organization. While we might evolve focus areas and how we work as the industry itself evolves, the core principles for why ONA exists remain true. Our vision, mission and values are incorporated in everything we do.
In their welcome remarks at the annual conference in New Orleans, ONA Executive Director/CEO Irving Washington and Board President Mandy Jenkins provided insight into ONA’s history and impact so far and how we are thinking about the years ahead. Watch their remarks.
Join us
As ONA founder Rich Jaroslosky noted in his inaugural address at the first ONA conference, “The only way this works is if everyone here takes ownership of the organization starting right now.” Join us in celebrating 20 years of ONA and in contributing to the next 20 years.
- Subscribe to the ONA Weekly newsletter to receive regular updates on programs and opportunities to get involved.
- Explore the #Happy20thONA stories shared by the community, and contribute your own — tell us how your ONA experience has impacted your work and career.