‘Narrative Change Gathering’ brings journalists, business leaders, and elected officials to Charleston
By Matthew Young, RealWV
CHARLESTON, W.Va. – The Greater Kanawha Valley Foundation (GKVF), on Friday, held their “Narrative Change Gathering” at the Four Points by Sheraton, in downtown Charleston. The event provided an opportunity for journalists, non-profits, business leaders, and community members to network, participate in workshops, and hear creative ideas from top media performers.
Attendees included publisher Crystal Good of Black By God: The West Virginian, Kate Long with the Voices of West Virginia Project, Trey Kay from WV Public Broadcasting, Kanawha County Commissioner Natalie Tennant, reporter Erin Beck with the Mountain State Spotlight, and many others. Visual artist Ian Bode was also in attendance, and created a drawing of a live, illustrated record of the gathering.
Poet Jamela Brown began the day with a recitation of her poem, “Are You Ready?” Brown, who can be heard on the Kross Barz podcast, took inspiration for the poem from an early gathering of the GKVF’s “Narrative Change Collaborative.”
After Brown’s recitation, and words of welcome from John Fisher, of the Truist Foundation and Endowments, Thomas Heywood, of the firm of Bowles Rice, led the room in a visioning-exercise.
With “Headline 2035,” Heywood instructed participants to create news headlines to report achieving their vision for the Kanawha Valley. With nearly 100 attendees filling the conference room, an understandably-wide array of headlines were presented. Topics ranged from healthcare, to economic improvements, to the expansion of Charleston’s Yeager Airport – with all headlines reflecting the hope for positive progress being made over the coming decade.
One such future headline stated, “McDowell County leads nation in Black billionaires.”
The Thrive Collaborative’s Gretchen Frankenberry then closed out the morning by leading the “Mapping the Narrative” workshop, which provided attendees with a lengthy networking opportunity.
Before lunch, the GKVF recognized their 2024 grant recipients, including:
- Black By God: The West Virginian
- Marshall University
- Mountain State Spotlight
- Tamarack Foundation
- RealWV
- West Virginia Community Development Hub
- West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission
- West Virginia Humanities Council
- West Virginia International Film Festival
- West Virginia Public Broadcasting
- West Virginia University
- WTSQ 88.1 FM
The afternoon featured four separate journalism and news-reporting discussion sessions. The first such session, “Bridging Local and National in Journalism Today,” was moderated by Ken Ward of the Mountain State Spotlight, and featured Mountain State Spotlight reporter Sarah Elbeshbishi. Dean Baquet and Sona Patel of the New York Times joined the panel from New York and Los Angeles, respectively, via Zoom.
“Building Local News From the Ground Up,” which featured Crystal Good and Traci Phillips of Black By God, followed Ward’s panel. Founded by Good, Black By God is West Virginia’s only existing Black newspaper, and has now surpassed its fifth year in publication. Joining Good and Phillips on the panel was Erica Perel, with the Tiny News Collective.
“Sustainability for Newsrooms in Appalachia,” with Appalachian Funders Network’s Ryan Eller and Marcia Parker of the New York Times, was next, followed by “Cost of the Story: Journalism, Care, and Accountability,” with Black Alder Labs’ Takara T. Pierce, to close out the day.
The GKVF’s Narrative Change Gathering was made possible through the sponsorship of the Truist Foundation and Endowments. To learn more about the GKVF, and the foundation’s work within the Kanawha Valley, visit tgkvf.org.
