In an Igbo proverb immortalized by the great Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe, there was a lizard who climbed to the top of the Iroko tree. When no one seemed to notice his accomplishment, the lizard said, “If no one will praise me, I must praise myself.” Our editorial and sales teams at The St. Louis American and the St. Louis American Foundation appreciate this proverbial West African wisdom.
Recently, The St. Louis American received first place for its Newspaper in Education (NIE) program among non-daily newspapers by the National Newspaper Association, which is the country’s largest newspaper association with 2,200 member newspapers. We took top honors in what was only our first year of presenting the program.
Every week, in our NIE program last year, 5,200 students in the Normandy and St. Louis Public Schools received a free newspaper, making it the largest free, print NIE program in the entire state of Missouri. One page of our paper was completely dedicated to giving teachers a tool they can use in their classrooms, and it included exercises and articles on STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) literacy.
That was last year. This school year, we’re expanding the program to also include Ferguson-Florissant, Hazelwood and East St. Louis school districts, and we’re adding another page called “Healthy Kids” that focuses on heroes in the health-care field, along with tips on wellness and safety. We do not intend to stop our expansion there.
Every so often in our small, dedicated newsroom, we throw around the story about the ambitious lizard and the proud loneliness of his accomplishment. On an annual basis, we are recognized as a state and national leader among weekly community newspapers, and we share this news with our peers, who seem to file this news in the trash can. We leave it to our readers to ponder why the secret of our successes is so well kept among our peers in local media. Of course, many of our counterparts in the daily print and broadcast media don’t specialize in reporting positive local news about anyone.
For us, the NIE recognition is special because this program accords deeply with our core values of empowering public educators and reaching our children when they are young to encourage them to become lifelong learners. As many know, the St. Louis American Foundation has been awarding educators and providing college scholarships to students for 26 years, through the Salute to Excellence program, which has fostered $2.5 million in scholarships. And we are far from finished with this important work in enabling the next generation of learners and leaders.
The American’s NIE award was part of the National Newspaper Association’s annual Newspaper And Education contest, which highlights newspaper/school partnerships that focus on developing fully informed citizens, and the category was centered around “traditional newspaper in education stories and curriculum.” In the judges’ comments, they stated, “This newspaper set a very high standard and attained it, and used it as a baseline for not only keeping the program, but fully supporting it with a full-time coordinator.”
Beyond the fact that The American won a national first-place award in its first year administering an NIE program, the award also speaks to our focus on sustainability. In a time when many newspapers are failing, we are looking for ways to revitalize dormant parts of the industry and apply it to our model of positive community journalism.
As the lizard in the proverb knows, it’s a good view from the top of the Iroko tree. If nothing else, we have a better view of the dangers and opportunities ahead.
