K-12 Education Reporter: Aldine, Alief, Pasadena and Spring ISDs

The Houston Landing is looking for individuals to add to our team of passionate people on a mission to advance democracy in our communities and strengthen the lives of all Houstonians one story at a time. Houston Landing is an independent, nonpartisan news organization devoted to public service journalism. Initially supported by three of Houston’s leading philanthropies including Arnold Ventures, The Houston Endowment, and the Kinder Foundation, we are building a team to support our efforts in sustainability and revenue growth. Houston Landing is seeking an enterprising journalist to report on four of the most important school districts in Houston: Aldine, Alief, Pasadena and Spring. 

This is a new position created as part of the Landing’s expansion of its education team, which will feature five reporters, an editor focused solely on education coverage and an audience engagement producer embedded within the team. Compensation is commensurate with experience, with a minimum salary of $70,000.

This position offers a unique chance to cover large, urban school districts that historically have received minimal community- and accountability-focused news coverage, despite combining to serve 180,000 of the region’s highest-need children. Nearly 90 percent of students attending these districts qualify for free or reduced lunch, almost 75 percent are classified as “at-risk” of falling behind in school or dropping out, and about 30 to 50 percent primarily speak Spanish or another non-English language.

The Landing is committed to providing families in these districts with information that helps them understand what’s happening in their schools, as well as outfitting them with the tools they need to secure the best possible education for their children. This will require mixing the traditional foundations of journalism — dogged beat reporting and enterprising investigative work — with modern approaches to audience engagement. You will work closely with other members of the education team, as well as our broader audience, marketing and event teams, to ensure our work reaches communities that have historically been ignored by mainstream media outlets. We also plan to hire a general assignment reporter who would assist with reporting, content generation and audience work.

Requirements

The reporter’s primary responsibilities would include:

• Day-to-day coverage of breaking and important district news, provided it is through a student- and family-focused lens.
• Enterprise reporting on these districts, with a particular focus on bilingual education, literacy and access to school programs.
• Explainers, guides and other tools that help parents navigate these districts and get the best possible education for their children.
• Working with the audience engagement producer and other staffers to produce content on platforms that align with the audiences in these districts (i.e. WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, paper distribution, local partner platforms).
• Cultivating relationships with community leaders and other community members who can help us distribute our content to target audiences.

Spanish fluency is required for this position, given that large shares of students and families in our target districts primarily speak Spanish. Comfort generating written and/or video content in Spanish is preferred.

What we seek:

We encourage all interested applicants to apply. Each of the following skills is preferred, though not all are required.

• Experience cultivating strong source relationships with community members in coverage areas, as well as those in higher echelons of power.
• Strong writing, with an emphasis on clarity, context and brevity that respects the time of readers and viewers.
• Multimedia skills that demonstrate an ability to take pictures, shoot video and leverage social platforms to expand the reach of the story. 
• A collaborative spirit that fits the Houston Landing. We work closely across news teams and with our audience, visual marketing and product teams to create the best possible package for our audience.
• Experience with computer-assisted and data reporting. Our state and federal government publish extensive data that can lead to fantastic stories.
• Experience covering education is beneficial, but we are ultimately seeking a reporter who will approach the position with a fresh, open-minded, audience-first perspective.
• Spanish fluency is required, and comfort generating written and/or video content in Spanish is preferred.

This reporter will report to Team Leader Jacob Carpenter, an experienced education journalist who has been a finalist for the IRE, National Headliner and Livingston awards. The reporter also will collaborate closely with a general assignment reporter, whose primary responsibilities will include assi