A support group and a lab in the St. Louis area provide resources for people with the allergy to mammal products — and evidence that its effects can be reversed.
Weather records from the early 1900s are stacked on a bookshelf in Columbia, Mo. Credit: Harshawn Ratanpal, KBIA
We recently published this piece from Harshawn Ratanpal, "Drought means ‘drier than normal,’ but ‘normal’ is changing." This week, he shares a bit about that reporting process, including lessons in how we communicate the importance of complicated science and environment topics.
Here's Harshawn:
Desk reporter Harshawn Ratanpal, KBIA
"As journalists, it can sometimes be tough to convince people they should care about a story. While it’s easy to get clicks if you have the scoop on a political scandal, more often, reporters are being asked by their editors (and themselves): “why should people care about this?”
I’ve found this can be a particularly difficult, but important, question to answer for environmental stories.
In the piece, we dig into the nitty-gritty of how drought is determined, the history of the U.S. Drought Monitor, and how federal policy-makers came to use it as a barometer for drought relief. We also featured a farmer who was affected by federal drought conditions but wasn’t receiving relief from the government that year.
There’s enough there for many of our readers to care. But sometimes the best way to convince people to care is to go out and tell them why they should.
Desk reporter Harshawn Ratanpal of KBIA presents about changing drought definitions at Mizzou's Water Week. Credit: Sara Shipley Hiles
To that end, back in April I had the pleasure of speaking to students at the University of Missouri about my stories on drought. By getting in front of folks in-person and walking them through the reporting process, I was able to take a dry story (sorry) and turn it into something that made a splash (again, sorry).
As an early-career reporter, I only know a world where a bulk of reporting can be done from inside of an office, glued to a computer. Going out to speak with people in my community — particularly young people interested in science — was incredibly fulfilling, and helped me get a sense of the kinds of stories people connect with, and how to tailor our stories to be maximally useful.
This has helped me tell stories better: to make them simple, conversational and straightforward. At the end of the presentation, I teased the drought story I was considering writing next: if drought is defined as drier-than-normal conditions, what happens if climate change is changing the normal? I saw ears perk up as people wanted me to tell them more. Now, with the reporting done and the story published, I can."
Michael here again. Many thanks to Harshawn for the excellent reporting and insights. The fundamentals of journalism remain true: News doesn't happen in the newsroom, as one of my old editors said, so get out in the community and talk to people, whether for a story or about a story.
We also want to share that we'll soon post two full-time job openings for our Editorial Director and Assistant Editorial Director positions. Watch this space for more details. In the meantime, we are searching for two Expert Journalists to join our team. See that application here.
Thanks for reading. More next week from across the Basin.
