Summary: 120-160 hours from November 2022 through February 2023 (see details below), at £15/hr, working from anywhere in the UK.
Purpose of the work
The PINF Index 2023 will be PINF’s third annual review of the independent news publishing sector. We survey organisations with a turnover of less than £2m/year who provide public interest news in a predominantly text-based format. Our research leads, Dr Coral Milburn-Curtis and Dr Clare Cook analyse the data to help us gain insights into the shape and size of news publishers, as well as learning about the challenges and opportunities publishers face, and how they understand the benefits of their work for their community and society more broadly. You can see the earlier reports here.
Goal
For 2023’s Index, we are aiming to receive 100 complete survey responses from independent publishers. This level of data will allow us to run more complex analysis and thus gain new insight into what works for independent publishing.
Role
The role of the researcher will be to help PINF hit this goal of 100 responses, through working to:
Maintain, correct and grow an existing spreadsheet of independent news publishers, particularly collating and correcting contact details;
Contact publishers by phone or email to complete the survey.
Benefits Pay: £15/hr, plus £50 to cover phone bill expenses over the project. In addition, the role is an opportunity to learn more about the vital public interest news role for independent news publishers across the UK. You will gain experience in conducting research by playing in a key role in gathering data for PINF’s Index 2023, the leading report on independent news publishers in the UK.
Experience/qualities for the role
The right person for this role will have the ability and drive to work systematically and independently, knowing when to ask for help when needed. You will be comfortable working with spreadsheets and have excellent attention to detail. You will have a helpful attitude and good communication skills via email and phone. An interest in, and awareness of, the UK’s independent news media would be desirable.
Dates/hours of work
The work will take place from November 2022 through February 2023.
The first part of the project in Nov/Dec will involve collecting and cleaning data. We imagine this at about 5hrs per week. You could choose when to do these hours.
The second part of this project in Jan/Feb will involve contacting publishers, ideally by phone. We imagine this at about 10hrs per week, which will likely need to be done during normal business hours.
We are open to a discussion about exactly how and when the work is completed.
How to apply
Please email contact@publicinterestnews.org.uk with ‘Index 2023 research assistant’ as the subject line.
Please include a short statement about you, why you would like the role and about any relevant work experience (esp. in research work) you have. Please also include some ideas of your ideal working hours over the project.
Lastly, please attach or link to a spreadsheet you have created or managed. If you have not done this before, please create one and include three rows of data on any UK-based independent news publishers: their name, website and location.
Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis until the position is filled. Please be aware that as a small team, we may not be able to reply to all applications.