There’s a long list of things local newsrooms lack – good coffee, office space, time. 

Of course, budgets are at the top of that list. I’m not talking budgets for raises or even projects, but the money to send staffers to conferences, help them get training and build new skills.

In most places, there’s not a lot of money for growth (which is a terrible retention strategy, by the way). But your newsroom not having the funds for all of the above doesn’t mean that money doesn’t exist. Sometimes, you have to look for it. Always, you have to ask for it.

Take, for example, the upcoming Independent News Sustainability Summit. This conference, held jointly by LION, News Revenue Hub and The Texas Tribune’s RevLab, with funding from the Knight Foundation, takes place Oct. 27-29 in Austin. And there’s a travel scholarship of between $250 and $1,000. 

Maybe you’d like to deepen your expertise or switch beats?

Search for fellowships and grants, such as the Shorenstein Center’s residential fellowship or the Center for Health Journalism’s Data Fellowship. Here’s a collection of fellowship opportunities. (Not all of them require you to relocate or stop working full time.)

Poynter programs, including our stellar Leadership Academy for Women in Media, often offer financial aid. 

There’s even funding to help your reporting. Consider the Fund for Investigative Journalism, the Society for Environmental Journalists and the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Global Investigative Journalism Network has a full list of options.

Whatever you do, don’t take “not in the budget” for an answer. There’s money out there. Go find it!

Here’s some more of what I’m paying attention to:

Is your newsroom collaborating with a university, or vice versa? Let the people studying newsroom-university partnerships from AEJMC and the Center for Community News at the University of Vermont know.

Read about the 77-year-old journalist who’s keeping the paper running in Iowa.  

Learn about the veteran journalist who started a print newspaper.

Check out this newsroom’s year-in-review. I love the approach Racket took to being transparent.

Join Poynter in September for United Facts of America, a virtual festival of fact checking.

Learn more about Cherry Road Media, which is “bringing tech to community newspapers.”

Congrats to the latest newsrooms to get funding from the American Journalism Project: Verite, ICT and The City.

That’s it for me. It’s the last week of summer in my house before my kids start middle school and high school, so basically all they’re doing right now is sleeping. Oh to be so well-rested!

Kristen