Last week, we welcomed Media Impact Funders’ new executive director Abby Rapoport with an online meet-and-greet for funders. The conversation, moderated by MIF board chair Kayce Ataiyero, was shaped by questions submitted in advance by funders, and offered Abby a chance to reflect on her career path, share what drew her to MIF at this moment, and outline her early priorities for the organization. The following is an edited Q&A from that exchange.
Kayce Ataiyero: You’ve done a lot in a really eclectic and interesting career. Why MIF? Why now?
Abby Rapoport: I started as a journalist and that was kind of where I thought I would stay for my whole career. I loved being a reporter and I also was lucky because my career started at, what I didn’t realize at the time, was an extraordinary moment of change in the field. It was the very beginning of nonprofit journalism’s ascendancy.
I was the first employee at the Texas Tribune. I got to see how that nonprofit was set up and started. Then I ended up working in publishing, and have been a small-scale publisher for the past seven years. At the same time, I’ve worked on the grantmaking side of things, having sat on the board of a family foundation that’s been a longtime media funder.
I’ve loved being able to bring different hats to different problems. At MIF, it’s really exciting because I get to bring my full suitcase. I know what it is to be a funder. I know what it is to be desperately in need of funds and trying to figure out what funders are looking for. I know what it’s like to be a journalist just wanting to do the work and really being sometimes limited or sometimes empowered based on the resources available. And so for me, MIF is an opportunity to bring all of those skills and experiences.
What I love about MIF is that it’s an opportunity for ecosystem thinking. I think that’s really important right now that we have a lot we can teach each other. We should be listening to each other. Whether you’re foremost in documentary film or foremost in local daily news or international funding, there are so many different lenses through which to see this work.
This is a moment where we need to be listening to each other and learning from each other because the stakes are so high. For me, I just love helping funders think bigger, think more ambitiously about what is possible, and I think MIF is the ideal place from which to do that work.
KA: Can you share a little bit about your thinking on where you’d like to take MIF in this critical moment for media funding? What are some of your top priorities over the next year?
AR: What I’ve started with is listening. From the minute the announcement came out last month, I really tried to schedule as many calls as I could. I’m looking at the folks on this call and many of you I’ve either talked with or am talking to in the coming weeks. I really want to listen and hear how MIF can be a partner and be helpful to you.
My fundamental goal is to make funding media easier and more expansive. Whether you’re just starting to think about media funding, or whether you’re old hat at this, I want to be your partner as you navigate what comes next.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how we can bring more funders into the conversation. There are a lot of people who are doing media funding, but don’t think of themselves as media funders.
My goals are growing the number of funders in media, growing the dollars in the field, and building a more inclusive conversation to include different kinds of philanthropy and different kinds of funders. I also want to lean into how MIF can be a great partner. There’s a lot of great work happening, not just among funders, but among other support organizations. Another goal I have is determining how MIF can amplify and support other great work that’s happening.
KA: How might MIF play more of a leading role in the media funding community and be even more active in bringing together funders and practitioners around priority areas in media?
AR: One of the things we can do really well is cross-pollinate and connect conversations. There’s a great conversation happening around local news right now. There’s a different, really important conversation happening around international funding. There’s a different conversation that’s really important happening around documentary funding. And I say “a” conversation, but there are many. How can we make sure that what we’re learning in one place can be shared in others?
I think similarly, there’s some interesting things to learn from other fields. For instance, I’ve been reading a lot about what’s happening in science funding right now. Those problems are different but not dissimilar. What are some frameworks and ways of thinking that we can borrow and what can we share with their field? There are places that haven’t had to lean on philanthropy as much and now they’re faced with a different set of challenges. What do we as a field have to share?
I’m also thinking a lot about how we can meet differentiated needs. We have a diversity of needs as a field. How can MIF think about programming that meets those needs?
Someone [on the call] inquired about climate funding. I want to convene groups across both journalism and documentary who are talking about how to tell climate stories in important and critical ways. I also want to convene folks who are doing international media funding and bring together some of those lessons in one place that may be transferable to another.
KA: What do you think MIF currently does well and what are some of the things you’re looking to change?
AR: I think MIF’s events are extraordinary. They’re produced at an extraordinary level. They bring in amazing speakers and talk about really important topics often ahead of the game. If you want to know what everyone’s going to be talking about in six months, you can come to an MIF event six months earlier and you’ll find out.
I think that’s been one of this organization’s and this community’s real strengths. A huge credit to Vince Stehle and the team for figuring out how to have those conversations. I’d love to start ramping up those conversations.
How do we prep and work with our membership to be in a position where they show up at our events and are ready to take full advantage? They’ve been thinking about these topics. They’ve already built some of this community. They show up and these events are galvanizing experiences and they’re able to continue that work afterwards.
KA: Shifting a little bit to the broader media funding landscape, which you talked about earlier, what changes do you think need to happen? What’s missing when it comes to media funding?
AR: I think sometimes with media funding conversations, we talk about successes without necessarily figuring out what the lessons of those successes are, and it doesn’t always help other funders in a similar position.
I’ve experienced this. My family’s from Waco, Texas, and I’ve been very involved in journalism in Texas, especially in Waco. When Waco foundations decided they wanted to figure out a local journalism solution in their community, there wasn’t an existing, robust media infrastructure there. This is true for most communities. For all the great work that’s happened, we don’t have really good playbooks for when you’re a single funder trying to figure out what’s the next step for me.
I think figuring out as a field how to share not just happy stories, but lessons and replicable takeaways from what did or didn’t get done. I think this is something we as a field haven’t always been good at and sometimes that’s because the conversations are hard. How can MIF build spaces for those conversations? Sometimes those spaces need to be built publicly and sometimes privately, maybe some of the conversations MIF is hosting are smaller and quieter so that people can be more candid and forthright about some of those harder lessons.
The stakes are so high right now that I’m hopeful people will bring the full complement of their lessons learned. We can’t afford as a field to just try and do window dressing. We have to talk about the messiness as well. That’s where the magic happens.
KA: The next question is more of a specific and tactical one. Do you have concerns about foundations funding news outlets directly?
AR: My concerns are only when funders are jumping in blind. I say the key is clarity and transparency. I think if everybody understands the operating agreement, rules of engagement and the ethical constraints, you can do anything. You can fund whatever you want, but you want to be really clear and you want all of that worked out in advance.
This is still a new area. It’s only 15 to 20 years old. It’s grown leaps and bounds, which is tremendously exciting. But I think there are a lot of knowledge gaps around what the troubles can often become down the road.
This is a great question for MIF. How can we better equip funders who are going to fund directly to see where the choppy waters are going to be? How can we help funds ensure their grant agreements offer grantees protections? I think those kinds of conversations and protections are critical. But as long as you’re doing all that, I think it’s for each funder to make their own choices about their priorities and what best aligns with their goals.
KA: These are heavy times for media funding and civil society at large. What brings you joy these days and what gives you hope about the road ahead?
AR: As far as joy, this summer I took up felting and it’s been great for two reasons. One because it’s a little bit of a rage outlet and two because it’s very cute and creative. You take wool and stab a needle into it a million times to make it into a little shape. I made little birds and dolls for my kids. I don’t know if it was the creative element or just getting to stab something a lot of times when I was feeling frustrated, but it was great, so I highly recommend.
I’ll also say I’ve been reading, not unrelated to MIF, a book that gives me hope. It’s called “Aristocracy of Critics,” by Steven Bates and it’s about the Hutchins Commission, which took place in the ‘40s and is really shaped by a lot of what happened in the ‘30s, both in the U.S. and Europe. There’s so much of a sense that all is lost and democracy is over. There are questions like: What’s going to replace it? What’s the role of media in all of this? Can media ever be good?
It’s fascinating to read and see a different time period and what conversations were happening. It makes me feel like we can find better answers. There’s an opportunity to build something better, something that does more for people. It’s not that there aren’t really big challenges ahead, but I think there’s so much creative thinking and eagerness to continue to do this work. This work has to keep happening. It’s too important to stop.