’Tis is the season of gratitude. Public radio and TV stations — and every other nonprofit in the U.S. — are reaching out to their audiences and supporters to ask for year-end donations. It’s the givingest time of the year. People are feeling most generous, inspired to show appreciation and get that tax deduction before midnight on December 31.
Current is joining you in this year-end ritual, hoping for oranges instead of coal in our holiday stockings.
First, let me express my sincere gratitude to you and the public media world for the respectful, thoughtful, inclusive tone you set for our communities and our country. I am grateful for the ways public media informs and entertains us, introduces new ideas and music, and tells stories of substance, stories that stick. I am grateful for your part in this visionary service, and I am thankful for Current, the publication that helps keep public media professionals connected and inspired throughout the year.
That’s why I’m asking you to join me in making a personal contribution to Current, to help sustain this nonprofit service to you and your peers. As you are making your list and checking it twice, will you add Current to that list?
So, where does your gift go?
Your donation helps support our small team of journalists, designers and student interns who work hard to produce news and share ideas and analyses that help you succeed in your job.
Your donation helps ensure that Current can offer deeply discounted subscriptions to tiny community broadcasting stations, independent producers, students and retirees.
Your donation helps unlock the magic of NewsMatch, a national campaign that will double your donation dollar for dollar.
It costs about $1 million per year to produce Current online and in print. The largest chunk of our funding comes from advertising, followed by a generous grant from the Wyncote Foundation that helps support our operations. Subscriptions are a growing source of revenues, and we are especially thankful to those stations that have opted for the Universal subscription, providing access to Current for all of their employees, regardless of role or seniority.
But your individual donation, dear reader, is our most rewarding source of revenue, because it’s personal and optional. It’s a vote of confidence, and it truly helps us close the year in a spirit of celebration.
Your gift will help us provide journalism that matters, like:
- Our coverage of Local that Works – station initiatives that are showing a way to a sustainable future for public media
- Our reporting from nearly a dozen conferences, PBS, NPR and CPB board meetings
- Our news about mergers, acquisitions, collaborations and innovations in public media
- Our publication of “How we did it stories” from your peers across the country
Will you do your part to keep Current flowing for yourself, your colleagues and the next generation of public media?
All month, we invite you to nominate pubmedia people you admire to the Public Media Honor Roll. Perhaps it’s a mentor who paved the way for you. A leader who is retiring or who created a vibrant, healthy workplace. A trailblazer who created something enduring. A colleague who passed away. A co-worker who helped you achieve your goals. A host who’s been a friendly companion or a joy to work with. A person whose contribution or legacy to our field should not be forgotten.
When you make a tax-deductible contribution to Current, your honoree will receive notice from us, and their names will be published online and in the January print edition of Current.
At this time of year, please think about who and what you are grateful for, and please make that donation to Current to honor the past, celebrate the present and secure the future.
Many thanks,
Julie Drizin & the team at Current