Joaquin Alvarado, senior vice president, digital innovation, American Public Media

The 70 Knight Community Information Challenge projects funded so far have led to collaborations with nearly 450 organizations - from libraries, to tech groups, universities, legacy and new media and more.

Partnerships are so prevalent, that community and place-based foundations often ask for tools and tips in making them effective. So Knight and the consulting firm FSG talked with the leaders of successful projects, gathered their insights into a new report - and organized a panel discussion at the Media Learning Seminar offering lessons learned.

With less resources available for community news and information projects, collaboration and partnerships are more valuable and necessary than ever before, said Joaquin Alvarado, senior vice president, digital innovation, American Public Media.

But what creates some of the most successful partnerships? Alvarado says it’s about getting people from different communities active and engaged, earning their loyalty and providing long-term commitment to the partnership. It’s also about using technology to really engage with residents and making sure they feel their voices are heard in the communities.

Knight Foundation is helping TurboVote, which aims to make the voting process as easy as renting from Netflix, expand into new communities and develop its platform. The funding is part of a series of Knight grants that support new ways to deepen Americans’ engagement in elections and foster more informed communities.

Co-Founder Seth Flaxman talks about the effort:

Our democracy is in trouble. The United States ranks 138th in voter participation – behind every major democracy, according to the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance.

As a grad student, I was on my way to contributing to the problem when I missed three elections in a row. I figured it was easier to build TurboVote, a platform that simplifies the voting process, than to find a printer and stamp to change my registration and then keep track of when local elections were taking place.

Looking back two years later, it turned out that TurboVote was sort of hard to build - but I'm still glad we did it.

 

If you missed - or are looking for a refresher on -  Knight's 2012 Media Learning Seminar, we've rounded up all the info you need to help you catch up.

Check out:

• Dan Gillmor: Six ways foundations and community groups can help keep communities informed and engaged
• Ideas you can steal: Community information projects that worked
• Lessons learned from using the Community Information Toolkit
• Ethan Zuckerman, on how to use media to amplify community voices
• Insights learned in building community partnerships
• A round-up of tweets from Day 1 and Day 2 on Storify
• Session videos will be available later this week here.

Enjoy!