In 2022, 46 journalists and technologists from 16 countries joined forces during the JournalismAI Fellowship to experiment on ways AI can enhance journalism.

They worked for eight hours a week on various projects that ranged from using AI to research hate speech directed against journalists and environmental activists, to auto-creating “context cards” that accompany news articles, as well as making image recognition more inclusive for newsrooms. You can read more about the 10 projects that the Fellows worked on last year on the Fellowship website.

The Fellowship was an effort in collaboration across multiple time zones, newsroom departments, and between various news organisations. While the Fellows and their final products made the process seem effortless, collaboration is far from easy.

As we set out to launch the 2023 JournalismAI Fellowship in the coming weeks, we wanted to share some of our key reflections and lessons learned from the feedback we received from the 2022 cohort.

Collaboration was at the heart of Fellows’ motivation to apply for the programme

One of the key factors that led news organisations to apply for the Fellowship was the opportunity to work with an international group of peers, learning how different newsrooms use AI, and creating partnerships with other organisations.

The Fellowship was a space for focused work

Participants appreciated how the Fellowship gave them time to step away from their routine responsibilities (and day-to-day pressure) and take time out to focus on creative, innovative work that would help them advance professionally.

Experts guided the teams, but, more can be done

All Fellowship teams were connected with experts and mentors who guided them in their work. While we, the JournalismAI team, reached out to our wider community to find the right support the teams, our Fellows wished they had even more
one-on-one guidance from experts. This is feedback we are working on and will be implementing in the 2023 JournalismAI Fellowship programme.

If you’d like to be a mentor supporting our 2023 Fellowship team/s, email me at Lakshmi@journalismai.info.

The Fellowship helped boost AI literacy – and started, accelerated, or inspired other AI projects

Fellows shared that their self-assessed AI literacy rates grew by 32%: from an average of 2.90 (out of 5) before the Fellowship to 3.84 at the end of the Fellowship.

Crucially, more than half (55%) of the Fellows indicated that the Fellowship helped start, inspire, or accelerate other AI projects in their respective organisations.

“We’re working on a new project that is looking at possible AI tools to improve production processes as well as social media monitoring,” said one of the Fellows after completing the Fellowship.

Here is what other Fellows shared about their experience:

❝ The JournalismAI Fellowship Programme is the best opportunity to get hands-on AI technologies for journalism. This has been one of the most enriching experiences in my career, and has allowed me to acquire new skills that are relevant to my field. The programme gave me the opportunity to collaborate with colleagues from diverse backgrounds and from numerous newsrooms, and helped small newsrooms like ours, get on board with cutting-edge technologies.❞

❝ It was a wonderful opportunity to connect with brilliant innovators across the world who are passionate about the future of journalism. The exposure to ‘what is possible’ with AI was an inspiring exercise for our still-young newsroom.❞

❝ The JournalismAI Fellowship Programme was a fantastic opportunity to learn more about the potential of AI/ML in journalism, to push the boundaries of interdisciplinary cooperation and to connect with outstanding AI experts who have helped us boost our AI literacy. Thank you so much for this experience!❞

Since JournalismAI’s inception, we’ve often said that collaboration is one of the ways in which the use of and impact of AI technologies in newsrooms can become more equitable.

As generative AI, and the potential for AI in newsrooms, become a mainstream topic, our Fellowship programme acts as a catalyst to help seed and launch new AI-journalism products and projects, in addition to providing a space to accelerate existing Proofs-of-Concept.

We are getting ready to launch the 2023 JournalismAI Fellowship with new improvements. If you’re interested in joining us on this journey, make sure to join our mailing list to get notified when applications open for the 2023 cohort.

Have any questions or want to know more about the Fellowship? Email me at Lakshmi@journalismai.info.

JournalismAI is a global initiative of Polis and it’s supported by the Google News Initiative. Our mission is to empower news organisations to use artificial intelligence responsibly.