THE OPEN NOTEBOOK
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
Science journalists play a demanding role in society—they must not only explain the newest advances in scientific research, but also provide critical context and analysis on issues as ranging from infectious disease to renewable energy; shed light on the human beings behind the research; and serve as watchdogs to help ensure the continued freedom and integrity of the scientific enterprise. To fulfill such a role takes skill. And the skills that science journalists need are endangered. Only a fraction of working science journalists are trained in formal journalism programs. And with the shrinking number of traditional staff jobs available, science journalism is fast moving toward a "gig economy" that relies on freelancers to produce work once done by staffers. One effect of that shift is that fewer journalists have the opportunity to master skills through the natural mentoring that takes place in newsrooms.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Craft-focused articles on science journalism
The Open Notebook has published more than 500 reported features, in-depth interviews, annotated stories, profiles, and other tools and resources aimed at helping science journalists at all levels of experience improve their skills. The organization's book, THE CRAFT OF SCIENCE WRITING: SELECTIONS FROM THE OPEN NOTEBOOK, is widely used in science journalism courses and by aspiring and working science writers.
Mentoring programs
The Open Notebook offers several mentoring programs, including a year-long mentored fellowship for early-career science journalists. This intensive fellowship, supported by the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, provides an opportunity for fellows to work with a paid mentor to conduct story-behind-the-story interviews and report and write feature articles on the craft of science writing, for publication at The Open Notebook.
TON also hosts the Covering Science Slack Community. Supported by the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, the Covering Science Slack is a peer-mentoring community for local and general assignment reporters and editors.
The Sharon Dunwoody Science Journalism Mentoring Program is a free, nine-month mentoring program aimed at supporting journalists who are from underrepresented communities. This mentoring program is made possible at no cost to participants through the generous support of Science Sandbox and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.
TON en Español
The Open Notebook has published hundreds of articles aimed at helping science journalists sharpen their skills. Our readers come from almost every country in the world, and include thousands of people whose first language is Spanish. TON en Espaol is a collection of dozens of popular TON articles translated into Spanish.
Diverse Voices in Science Journalism
The Diverse Voices in Science Journalism series, which contains dozens of in-depth reported articles centered on DEI issues, aims to examine the experiences, expertise, and perspectives of science journalists from communities that are underrepresented in science journalism. This program is a partnership with the National Association of Science Writers Diversity Committee and is supported by the Simons Foundation.
Science Journalism Master Classes
The Open Notebook’s free Science Journalism Master Classes, supported by the Kavli Foundation, help science journalists at all levels of experience sharpen their ability to find and vet story ideas, craft effective pitches, report and write impactful stories, collaborate with editors, and more. Each Science Journalism Master Class drills into one skill or habit, presented in a series of five to eight lessons, delivered by email. Students come away with greater mastery of their craft.
Science writing and editing workshops
The Open Notebook offers a number of different workshops, job simulations and other trainings, and consultations to help journalists, editors, and newsroom teams advance their skills in covering science.
Where we work
Awards
Community Award (Siri Carpenter) 2023
Online News Association
Affiliations & memberships
Institute for Nonprofit News 2022
External reviews
Photos
Our results
How does this organization measure their results? It's a hard question but an important one.
Number of participants attending course/session/workshop
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Science writing and editing workshops
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
The Open Notebook began offering online workshops for science writers and editors in 2022. We offer workshops under our own auspices and through media organizations, newsrooms, and universities.
Number of job skills training courses/workshops conducted
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Science writing and editing workshops
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
The Open Notebook began offering online workshops for science writers and editors in 2022. We offer workshops under our own auspices and through media organizations, newsrooms, and universities.
Number of unique website visitors
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Number of publications identifying sector best practices
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Craft-focused articles on science journalism
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
This metric relates to the number of articles we have published each year at our website, https://www.theopennotebook.com. Our articles focus on best practices in science journalism.
Number of overall donors
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Type of Metric
Other - describing something else
Direction of Success
Increasing
Number of grants received
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Type of Metric
Other - describing something else
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
The Open Notebook is dedicated to helping journalists who cover science cultivate their skills. We do this through articles and other resources published at TheOpenNotebook.com; through online courses, workshops, and mentoring programs; through partnerships with other organizations that share our vision; and through our book, The Craft of Science Writing.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
Since 2010, The Open Notebook has published more than 500 articles on the craft of science writing. These include story-behind-the-story interviews, reported features that focus on specific elements of the craft of science journalism, annotations of noteworthy science stories, and much more. We've also translated dozens of our stories into Spanish through our TON en Español program.
We’ve published dozens of articles and resource guides that center diversity, equity, and inclusion in science journalism. These include articles on topics such as covering Indigenous communities, reporting and writing with trans-inclusion in mind, navigating bias in newsrooms, finding diverse sources, tracking source diversity, using alt-text to make stories more accessible, freelancing on a student visa, and much more.
The TON Pitch Database is a searchable resource containing hundreds of successful queries to a wide range of publications. This unique tool gives science journalists the opportunity to study the first—and often the most difficult—step in producing outstanding science stories.
Our free Science Journalism Master Classes series, a collection of online courses delivered by email, helps science journalists at all levels of experience sharpen their ability to find and vet story ideas, craft effective pitches, report and write impactful stories, collaborate with editors, and more.
Our mentoring programs offer personalized support for science journalists. Our Early-Career Fellowship Program isa ten-month, paid fellowship that provides an opportunity for early-career science journalists to develop their skills by conducting story-behind-the-story interviews and creating reported features for publication at The Open Notebook, working with a dedicated mentor. The Covering Science Slack is a free peer-mentoring community for local and general assignment reporters and editors. The Sharon Dunwoody Science Journalism Mentoring Program is a free, intensive mentoring program aimed at increasing the diversity of voices covering science and supporting journalists who are from underrepresented communities or who have experienced higher than average barriers to entry to the field. Our International Students Slack Community is a place for science writers who are current, past, or aspiring international students to share information and advice about university applications, securing financial aid, dealing with visas and immigration issues, and other academic and day-to-day challenges of being an international student.
Our first book, The Craft of Science Writing, published in February 2020, offers an essential primer for science writers, students, and others who want to improve their science communication skills. A second, expanded edition will be published by the University of Chicago Press in 2024.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
The Open Notebook has been publishing regularly since October 2010, and weekly since January 2013.
The co-founders of The Open Notebook are Siri Carpenter and Jeanne Erdmann, experienced science journalists, each with more than 15 years' experience in the field. Carpenter, TON's editor-in-chief, is an award-winning freelance science journalist, contributing editor for Science News for Students, and former features editor at Discover magazine. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Science, Science News, Scientific American, Scientific American Mind, Spectrum, The Oprah Magazine, Prevention, and many other publications. Erdmann, TON's editor-at-large, is an award-winning health and science writer whose work has appeared in Discover, Women's Health, Aeon, Slate, The Washington Post, Nature Medicine, and Nature, among other publications.
TON's board includes 9 respected journalists whose work has been recognized with numerous awards.
Contributors to the site include dozens of highly regarded journalists and editors. Examples include Christie Aschwanden, Brooke Borel, Nadia Drake, Jeanne Erdmann, Laura Helmuth, Jude Isabella, Amanda Mascarelli, Michelle Nijhuis, Kendra Pierre-Louis, Tasneem Raja, Alexandra Witze, David Wolman, Ed Yong, Tom Yulsman, and Carl Zimmer, among many others.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
The Open Notebook was launched in October, 2010. Since then, nearly three quarters of a million people from around the world have visited the site, and tens of thousands are regular users, returning dozens of times. The Open Notebook is widely regarded as the “textbook of science journalism."
Our goals are:
* To continue to expand and deepen the resources we offer to help journalists improve their skills.
* To support increased diversity and inclusion in science journalism.
* To curate our resources to aid journalism instructors in incorporating TON into course planning and to allow journalists at all levels of experience to use TON as a self-directed curriculum.
How we listen
Seeking feedback from people served makes programs more responsive and effective. Here’s how this organization is listening.
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How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?
To identify and remedy poor client service experiences, To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To make fundamental changes to our programs and/or operations, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To identify where we are less inclusive or equitable across demographic groups, To strengthen relationships with the people we serve, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals
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Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?
We take steps to get feedback from marginalized or under-represented people, We aim to collect feedback from as many people we serve as possible, We take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on demographics (e.g., race, age, gender, etc.), We look for patterns in feedback based on people’s interactions with us (e.g., site, frequency of service, etc.), We engage the people who provide feedback in looking for ways we can improve in response, We act on the feedback we receive
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What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?
It is difficult to get the people we serve to respond to requests for feedback, We don’t have the right technology to collect and aggregate feedback efficiently, It is difficult to find the ongoing funding to support feedback collection, Staff find it hard to prioritize feedback collection and review due to lack of time
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
THE OPEN NOTEBOOK
Board of directorsas of 01/26/2024
Jane Hu
The Open Notebook
Term: 2020 - 2026
Jeanne Erdmann
Journalist/Freelance
Alexandra Witze
Journalist and author/Freelance
Ann Finkbeiner
Journalist and author/Freelance
Shraddha Chakradhar
Editor/Science
Siri Carpenter
The Open Notebook
Ashley Smart
Journalist/Undark
Sisi Wei
Journalist/Markup
María Paula Rubiano A.
Journalist/Freelance
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
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Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? No -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Yes -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes -
Board performance
Has the board conducted a formal, written self-assessment of its performance within the past three years? No
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
Gender identity
Transgender Identity
Sexual orientation
Disability
We do not display disability information for organizations with fewer than 15 staff.
Equity strategies
Last updated: 01/26/2024GuideStar partnered with Equity in the Center - an organization that works to shift mindsets, practices, and systems to increase racial equity - to create this section. Learn more
- We review compensation data across the organization (and by staff levels) to identify disparities by race.
- We employ non-traditional ways of gathering feedback on programs and trainings, which may include interviews, roundtables, and external reviews with/by community stakeholders.
- We use a vetting process to identify vendors and partners that share our commitment to race equity.
- We have a promotion process that anticipates and mitigates implicit and explicit biases about people of color serving in leadership positions.
- We seek individuals from various race backgrounds for board and executive director/CEO positions within our organization.
- We have community representation at the board level, either on the board itself or through a community advisory board.
- We help senior leadership understand how to be inclusive leaders with learning approaches that emphasize reflection, iteration, and adaptability.
- We engage everyone, from the board to staff levels of the organization, in race equity work and ensure that individuals understand their roles in creating culture such that one’s race identity has no influence on how they fare within the organization.