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The U.S. public wants more news coverage of climate change, surveys find

As hurricanes, floods, wildfires, and heat waves have intensified over the past decade, public concern about climate change has grown dramatically. Today, 65% of the U.S. public is worried about the issue, up from 52% a decade ago, according to nationally representative surveys conducted by scientists at Yale University and George Mason University.

Programs/Content

D.C. American Graduate event amplifies youth voices

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The five winners of American Graduate’s Raise Up hip-hop and spoken-word competition performed their original poems on the stage of Washington, D.C.’s Kennedy Center during a star-studded celebration Sept. 28. The Raise Up competition aimed to include more young people in conversations about high-school dropout rates. It came about through a partnership between CPB’s American Graduate initiative and Youth Speaks, a San Francisco–based nonprofit that seeks to empower young people through writing and performing. The contest was part of the American Graduate: Lets Make It Happen initiative, which focuses on helping communities reduce dropout rates.

Quick Takes

Programming in Brief: PRI launches women-focused initiative, WQXR offers Berlin concerts, and more

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Public Radio International will launch a multimedia program focused on women’s empowerment with a grant of about $1.28 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Across Women’s Lives is a “journalism and engagement initiative” examining the connection between women’s empowerment and health and economic development. The program highlights personal stories of women in Africa and India and looks at women’s lives from infancy to old age. The project’s content will be featured on PRI’s global news program The World and online. Additional content includes short video documentaries and educational tools to help listeners learn more about the topics covered.

System/Policy

FCC report aims to play up payout from spectrum auction

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An FCC-sponsored report projecting huge potential paydays for television broadcasters in next year’s spectrum auctions could prompt public TV licensees to reconsider decisions about participating in the complex proceeding. A full-power station in Los Angeles could fetch up to $570 million by giving up its assigned channel, while a similar property in New York might generate up to $490 million, according to a report by the investment banking firm Greenhill & Co. Issued Oct. 1 to spur interest in the voluntary proceeding, the report broadens the pool of prospective participants by projecting jaw-dropping values for TV channels outside of the top 30 markets. Full-power stations in Palm Springs, Calif., could bring to $180 million in the auction, for example, while a station in Providence, R.I., may be worth as much as $160 million, the report said.

System/Policy

Pittsburgh’s WQED implements layoffs as part of restructuring

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Pittsburgh’s WQED implemented layoffs this week as part of what it called a “minor reorganization” to help bring expenses in line with projected revenue. The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported Tuesday that WQED laid off three full-time employees and one part-time employee. The station also reduced five full-time employees to part-time and cut four vacant positions from its budget. “With the start of its new fiscal year on Oct. 1, 2014, WQED will reorganize staff to reflect the changing media landscape,” the station said in a prepared statement.

System/Policy

Libertarian Senate candidate sues Kentucky Educational Television over exclusion from campaign forum

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A Libertarian candidate for the U.S. Senate is suing Kentucky Educational Television, contending that the station is barring him from an upcoming candidate forum due to his political viewpoint. In a complaint filed Sept. 28 in U.S. District Court in Frankfort, David Patterson, along with the state and national Libertarian parties, asked a judge to order KET to include him in its Oct. 13 forum. The suit requests a temporary restraining order to prohibit enforcement of KET’s requirements for participation.

Capital Public Radio

As methods for online giving grow, stations should prepare for ‘different fundraising landscape’

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A mobile tipping point came earlier this year. For the first time, mobile devices accounted for 55 percent of Internet usage, according to January data from comScore, while laptops and desktops accounted for 45 percent of usage. The proportion of Americans who read email on their mobile devices has also crossed the halfway point, with a 2013 Pew Research Center survey finding that 52 percent of cellphone owners used their devices to send or receive email. For development professionals planning email appeals for year-end fundraising campaigns, these technology shifts will support or undercut the effectiveness of your efforts. Most donors who open your messages will read them on smartphones and tablets.

Programs/Content

OPB, Center for Investigative Reporting launch public TV version of Reveal

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A new series from the nonprofit Center for Investigative Reporting brings extensive investigative journalism to public television in four hourlong episodes. In its short run, Reveal aims to find new and engaging ways to tell investigative stories. Available to stations starting today, the show is presented by Oregon Public Broadcasting and distributed by the National Educational Telecommunications Association.  

An episode of Reveal is composed as a visual counterpart to a newspaper — starting with a topical, longer report, moving on to shorter reports and ending with an informative animation component. In one episode, a story early in the show focuses on a woman from Afghanistan who ran away from an arranged marriage to be with the man she loved, only to be found and sent to prison by her father.