Standards for working with outside groups

The Associated Press recognizes that working with the right organizations can help our newsroom fulfill our goals as journalists. This may be a foundation that offers funding to support expanded coverage, or another media outlet with expertise that complements ours.

AP seeks to work with organizations that support its mission of objective newsgathering and accountability in the following ways:

– Helping AP to develop additional capacity or expertise to better carry out impactful reporting.

– Aiding AP journalists in developing new skills and storytelling techniques suited to new ways of gathering, showing and sharing the news.

– Supporting software, design or engineering innovation to deliver news faster or more efficiently.

– Developing tools to help AP and the news industry better adapt to the rapidly changing digital world.

Standards review

Any newsroom partner, whether a foundation or another news organization, must align with AP News Values and Principles.

In general, AP seeks as collaborators:

– Media outlets that practice fact-based, objective journalism.
– Broad-based organizations such as universities and foundations created for the public good that fund a diversity of projects in many fields.
– Organizations committed to spreading general knowledge in a broad field, such as medicine or science.
– Organizations that believe in government and institutional accountability, freedom of information and opposition to censorship.

All collaborations are reviewed by AP’s vice president/editor at large for standards and vetted by a cross-departmental advisory group.

A core partnership principle is that AP’s journalism will be independent.

– We will not accept any grant that requires pre-publication review of stories or attempts to influence coverage.
– We will favor grants with a clear purpose of advancing defined news goals or areas of coverage.
– We will abstain from conversations with a potential funder about specific conclusions or outcomes that will be derived from the proposed reporting.
– We will aim for the highest practicable degree of transparency regarding editorial, donor and business standards and operations, including acceptance of outside funds. AP will publish a list of partner organizations below, and update that quarterly.
– AP will publish a list of partner organizations below and update that list each quarter.

As of March 25, 2021, AP’s recent newsroom partners include:

– Brown Institute for Media Innovation
– Carnegie Corporation of New York
– Chronicle of Philanthropy
– Frontline
– Google Digital News Initiative
– Howard Hughes Medical Institute Department of Science Education
– Indian Country Today
– Institute for Nonprofit News
– International Women's Media Foundation
– John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
– Lenfest Institute for Journalism
– Lilly Endowment
– McGraw Center for Business Journalism
– Missouri School of Journalism
– Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting
– Report for America
– Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting
– Solutions Journalism Network
– Walton Family Foundation

Standards for working with outside groups

The Associated Press recognizes that working with the right organizations can help our newsroom fulfill our goals as journalists. This may be a foundation that offers funding to support expanded coverage, or another media outlet with expertise that complements ours.

Standards review

All collaborations are reviewed by AP’s vice president/editor at large for standards and vetted by a cross-departmental advisory group.

A core partnership principle is that AP’s journalism will be independent.

As of March 25, 2021, AP’s recent newsroom partners include:

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