Editorial standards, practices

Our stories are your stories

We believe all citizens of Coastal Georgia have a great deal of common interests and concerns. We listen. We research. We provide data-based stories on issues that affect all our local communities, regardless of demographic or socio-economic background. We ask hard questions and go behind the scenes to report important stories, without fear or favor.

We seek to be a catalyst for improving the quality of life for all Georgians through our coverage of health and education, economic development, public safety, social issues and the environment. Sign up here to receive our regular newsletters: Soundings and Coastal Georgia politics on Tuesdays, Coast Watch for environmental updates on Wednesdays, Undercurrent brings public safety discussions on Thursdays, and Sunday Solutions works to inform for your weekend dinner conversations.

Tell us your stories: staff@thecurrentga.org

The organization, founded in September 2020, is overseen by Grey Matters Project, a 501(c)3 nonprofit with an independent board of directors. Board members act in a supporting role for The Current’s independent journalists.

Grey Matters Project recognizes the independence of editors and reporters of any journalism enterprise.  Editorial function and news coverage of any funded project or news story shall remain independent of the donors and of Grey Matters Project, and no attempt shall be made to influence or interfere with the editorial policies or decisions of any underwritten project or news story.

Funders are not aware of specific stories the newsroom is working on and do not review them before publication. Funders do not have special or privileged access to reporters or newsroom leadership.

Underwriters, including grant funding, of specific editorial endeavors will be listed alongside or in conjunction with funded content. Even then, all content decisions will be made by journalists. The newsroom does not accept sponsored content or advertising.

The organization is committed to transparency and full disclosure of all donors, activities and interactions between the Board of Directors and newsroom.

We want to get our facts right at every turn, and we know The Current’s credibility with you depends on trust. We also know that errors are inevitable in any human endeavor, and we pledge to correct or clarify our work promptly and transparently.

To report a problem: If you see information that warrants correction or clarification, please contact us at staff@thecurrentga.org. In the subject line, alert us by typing “correction,” tell us where you see the error, and include your name and a voice number where you can be reached.

When we have published an error of fact, we will correct or clarify the story or item and replace it with correction information within the article and include an editor’s note about the change on the same web page. Errors of fact or clarifications will be noted at the top of the story; any changes that do not affect the facts of the story will be noted at the end, such as a typographical error in a name or place. If a story is updated with new information, we’ll note that at the top of the story with the time and date of the change. We have posted this policy on a separate page with a running list of corrections, editor notes and clarifications

Our work is only as strong as your feedback and information. If you’ve got questions, comments or news tips for us, please contact us. Your ideas and help are often the catalysts for impactful stories and accurate news for Coastal Georgia. There is always someone listening at this address: staff@thecurrentga.org or fill out this form to let us know the good, bad and ugly.

At least once a quarter, The Current hosts a listening and conversation event and/or another gathering to talk about community and our work. Go to our Current Events page to see what’s coming up and join us – we like meeting you in person. 

We work to provide transparency in every thing we do. We show our work, cite sources of data, credit our news partners and work to share credible information on social media and other platforms and through partners.

Datelines

Local story datelines indicate where the story originated from and if the reporter or key information came directly from an event or sources at that location. Generally, a dateline will mean a reporter was present but can mean the sources for the story were there. If a broader story is written from sources in a widely separated area, no dateline will be used.

News partners, policy on bylines

The Current believes in reaching as many people as we can with credible information to make daily decisions for navigating their worlds. Each day we share work we find from trusted nonprofit news organizations with the same goal in Georgia, as well as several across the South and the world. Here are brief introductions to some of our journalism partners in news and information.

We credit every story we publish to a reporter and original news source, and we add biographical information where available from the source. 

When a story has The Current as a byline it means the information was compiled by and reported by members The Current’s staff. We use this credit line when information requires aggregation, compilation or organization from various staff and/or official sources.

Social media 

The Current uses social media platforms as part of our goal to reach as many people as possible with credible information. We want our channels to be a space where members of the community can engage in respectful dialogue and commentary related to news and information. We support diversity of opinion, presuming that opinion is expressed in a constructive manner. We reserve the right to hide or remove comments we believe go against these community guidelines and may block users who consistently abuse these rules. Moderation decisions are subjective, but we will make them as diligently and consistently as possible. 

1. Profanity, vulgarity, racial slurs or personal attacks
2. Harassment of others or inappropriate commentary regarding tragedies
3. Threats of violence
4. Disturbing or R-rated images
5. Spam, including irrelevant links or photos not pertaining to our content

Facebook | X (formerly known as Twitter) | Instagram | reddit | Threads

As journalists, we must earn the trust of our readers every day and with every piece of content. Our professional integrity is the cornerstone of our credibility. Fairness and transparency must always be the hallmarks of The Current’s journalism. 

• We seek the truth and operate transparently.
• We serve the public interest.
• We operate with independence.
• We respect the law and treat others respectfully.
• We acknowledge a responsibility to seek out guidance to do the right thing.

Read the specifics and full ethics policy signed by each employee at this link.

The Current commits to publishing accurate news and information. We take many steps to ensure accuracy – we investigate claims with skepticism, question assumptions, challenge conventional wisdom, confirm information with experts and seek to corroborate sources. We verify content against source documents or make clear who is providing the information. We may share relevant components of a story with a primary source or an outside expert to verify them.

We stand by the information as accurate. If it’s not, we will change it or clarify it as quickly as possible and be transparent with our readers about the error. We believe the record should be accurate.

We guide our journalists to ask the following questions when they double-check information in a quest for the truth.

• How do you know?
• How can you be sure?
• What is the evidence?
• Who is the source, and how does the source know?
• What is the support documentation?

We include the name and contact information of the reporter for each news item we publish.
We welcome feedback from our readers and sources regarding the information that we publish. This email is staffed at all times: staff@thecurrentga.org

As journalists, we’re reluctant to use unnamed sources and will do so only with the approval of the editor. We only use anonymous sources when their information is essential to an important story, we can’t get the verified information any other way and editors know the name of the source. Using an unnamed source should be rare and reporters do not grant “off the record” interviews without discussion with an editor.

As Georgia’s only women-led nonprofit newsroom, we are committed to building an equitable organization, the kind of workplace that we did not have as we came up in our careers. This means intentionally building a team over time whose demographics reflect the community we serve and represent multiple fault lines: race, gender, socioeconomic background, age and geography.

We want to erase the barriers for entry into the journalism business. Our workplace culture recognizes reporting as a crucial public service that deserves a livable wage so that early career reporters do not require second jobs and experienced ones can afford health care for their families.  

We recognize that accountability journalism can be produced in multiple formats from journalists with diverse resumes; we prioritize hiring journalists from Georgia and our coastal region because they understand our lived experience and can connect with readers who crave that connection. We recruit with updated listings on our site, myriad job sites and through others. We welcome all candidates.

All our readers, whether low income or middle class, should feel that we are shining a light on the problems they face. Our community and state leaders should understand that we will hold them to account on behalf of our readers, without fear or favor or partisan bias and rather, with a spirit of respect and with a goal of community improvement and solutions journalism.

Currently, we are 6 full-time staff members, several contract freelancers and a 5-person summer student staff. Our senior management team is made up entirely of women and the newsroom reflects most of the Maynard institute for Journalism Education Fault Lines for measuring diversity: race, class, gender, generation, geography and sexual orientation. Our newsroom staff age ranges from 25-63. We employ people from a range of economic and geographic backgrounds. We have a reporter who identifies as LGBTQ. See us and learn more about us at this link.

We collect information directly from you when you provide it to us or automatically as you navigate through the site. Information collected automatically may include usage details, IP addresses, and information collected through cookies and other tracking technologies, as further described below. This information helps us serve you better. We do not share it.

You can read our policy on technology, cookies, information and more at this link.