Skip to content
Project 2025
Search

Latest Stories

Follow Us:
Top Stories
The Iran War’s Price Tag: Billions Lost While Americans Go Without

The Iran War’s Price Tag: Billions Lost While Americans Go Without

A child holding a basket full of colorfully painted eggs.

Congress Bill Spotlight: Easter Monday Act, Federal Holiday

Kristi Noem facing away with her hand up to be sworn in as she testifies.

Kristi Noem is a Criminal. They Fired Her Because She’s a Woman

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting of the Cabinet in the Cabinet Room of the White House

Trump’s Troubled Appointees Face Scandals, Backlash, and Low Support

People at voting booths.

Just the Facts: Voter ID, States’ Powers, and Federal Limits

News Ambassadors radio pieces begin to air across the country

News Ambassadors logo
The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumApr 25, 2024
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
See More Writings by author

Divisive partisanship continues to threaten democracy, especially in the lead-up to the 2024 U.S. presidential election.

A new program, News Ambassadors — part of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund since 2022 — is working to lessen the divide through a collaborative journalism project to help American communities that hold different political views better understand each other, while giving student reporters a valuable learning experience in the creation of solutions reporting.

The program is directed by Shia Levitt, a longtime public radio journalist who has reported for NPR, Marketplace and other outlets. Levitt has also taught radio reporting and audio storytelling at Brooklyn College in New York and at Mills College in Oakland, Calif., as well as for WNYC’s Radio Rookies program and other organizations.

The project links journalism students to counterparts in politically or demographically dissimilar areas to collaborate on stories exploring solutions to contentious issues. News Ambassadors also fosters collaborations between journalism schools and public radio stations across the country to help fill gaps in local news coverage. The project trains journalism students on strategies to report stories that uplift solutions and common ground, and then students report stories informed by these new tools. The strongest stories are shared with local radio station partners for possible broadcast.

This spring, News Ambassadors has introduced students to solutions journalism and complicating the narratives, a conflict mediation- informed framework designed to help journalists improve their reporting on polarizing issues. This collaborative project helps young reporters better understand the perspectives of people outside the bubbles where they live, and helps American communities that hold different political views better understand each other.

News Ambassadors’ first stories are starting to wrap up from the 2023-24 project cohort.

Today’s audio story

Latinx people have lower voter turnout than the general population of Athens, Ga. Reporter Izzy Wagner visited a local nonprofit, Ulead, that’s working to boost civic engagement to help immigrant students succeed.

Wagner recorded this audio report.

This is the first of what will be many News Ambassadors pieces by radio station partners. For this piece, WUGA has been working in tandem with the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication and the Solutions Journalism Hub of the South to foster new radio voices as a part of its News Ambassadors program. Izzy Wagner is a senior and a News Ambassador.


Latest news

Paper currency from several countries.
Economy

Capital Shifts Toward Tangible Assets and Emerging Economies

This Is What a Victory for Democracy Looks Like

This Is What a Victory for Democracy Looks Like

A close up of two elderly individuals holding hands.
Community

Life's Meaning Comes From Its Ending - Not From What Comes After

Read More

Posters are displayed next to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) as he speaks at a news conference to unveil the Take It Down Act to protect victims against non-consensual intimate image abuse, on Capitol Hill on June 18, 2024 in Washington, DC.

A lawsuit against xAI over AI-generated deepfakes targeting teenage girls exposes a growing crisis in schools. As laws struggle to keep up, this story explores AI accountability, teen safety, and what educators and parents must do now.

Getty Images, Andrew Harnik

Deepfakes: The New Face of Cyberbullying and Why Parents, Schools, and Lawmakers Must Act

As a former teacher who worked in a high school when Snapchat was born, I witnessed the birth of sexting and its impact on teens. I recall asking a parent whether he was checking his daughter’s phone for inappropriate messages. His response was, “sometimes you just don’t want to know.” But the federal lawsuit filed last week against Elon Musk's xAI has put a national spotlight on AI-generated deepfakes and the teenage girls they target. Parents and teachers can’t ignore the crisis inside our schools.

AI Companies Built the Tool. The Grok Lawsuit Says They Own the Damage.

Whether the theory of French prosecutors–that Elon Musk deliberately allowed the sexualized image controversy to grow so that it would drive up activity on the platform and boost the company’s valuation–is true or not, when a company makes the decision to build a tool and knows that it can be weaponized but chooses to release it anyway, they are making a risk-based decision believing that they can act without consequence. The Grok lawsuit could make these types of business decisions much more costly.

Keep ReadingShow less
Sketch collage image of businessman it specialist coding programming app protection security website web isolated on drawing background.

Amazon’s court loss over Just Walk Out highlights a deeper issue: employers are increasingly collecting workers’ biometric data without meaningful consent. Explore the growing conflict between workplace surveillance, privacy rights, and outdated U.S. laws.

Getty Images, Deagreez

The Quiet Rise of Employee Surveillance

Amazon’s loss in court over its attempt to shield the source code behind its Just Walk Out technology is a small win for shoppers, but the bigger story is how employers are quietly collecting biometric data from their own workers.

From factories to Fortune 500 companies, employers are demanding fingerprints, palmprints, retinal scans, facial scans, or even voice prints. These biometric technologies are eroding the boundary between workplace oversight and employee autonomy, often without consent or meaningful regulation.

Keep ReadingShow less
Close up of a woman wearing black, modern spectacles Smart glasses and reality concept with futuristic screen

Apple’s upcoming AI-powered wearables highlight growing privacy risks as the right to record police faces increasing threats. The death of Alex Pretti raises urgent questions about surveillance, civil liberties, and accountability in the digital age.

Getty Images, aislan13

AI Wearables and the Rising Risk of Recording Police

Last month, Apple announced the development of three wearable smart devices, all equipped with built-in cameras. The company has its sights set on 2027 for the release of their new smart glasses, AI pendant, and AirPods with built-in camera, all of which will be AI-functional for users. As the market for wearable products offering smart-recording capabilities expands, so does the risk that comes with how users choose to use the technology.

In Minneapolis in January, Alex Pretti was killed after an encounter with federal agents while filming them with his phone. He was not a suspect in a crime. He was not interfering, but was doing what millions of Americans now instinctively do when they see state power in motion: witnessing.

Keep ReadingShow less
AI - Its Use, Misuse, and Regulation
Glowing ai chip on a circuit board.
Photo by Immo Wegmann on Unsplash

AI - Its Use, Misuse, and Regulation

There has been no shortage of articles hailing the opportunity of AI and ones forecasting disaster from AI. I understand the good uses to which AI could be put, but I am also well aware of the ways in which AI is dangerous or will denigrate our lives as thinking human beings.

First, the good uses. There is no question that AI can outthink human beings, regardless of how famous or knowledgeable, because of the amount of information it can process in a short amount of time. The most powerful accounts I've read have been in the field of medical research: doctors have fed facts into AI, asking for a diagnosis or a possible remedy, and AI has come up with remarkable answers beyond the human mind's capability.

Keep ReadingShow less
© Copyright 2026