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Dear Storyboard community,
This week, I thought I'd share some takeaways from my recent reading. We're now two months into Trump's second term. Thanks to brave and thoughtful reporting on the ground, the breaking news and standalone stories are bringing larger narratives into focus:
1. Tell the story chronologically
Washington Post reporters Karen DeYoung and Derek Hawkins present a harrowing timeline of events: This week, Elon Musk's DOGE, with assistance from the FBI and D.C. police, seized control of the U.S. Institute of Peace after a standoff with leaders of the agency. Congress founded the USIP in 1984 as a "nonpartisan, independent organization dedicated to protecting U.S. interests by helping to prevent violent conflicts and broker peace deals abroad." USIP leaders scrambled to cancel a contract with their own private security firm due to fears they were working with DOGE, and called 911 to summon D.C. police, only for officers to then let DOGE inside:
All USIP personnel present, including [USIP President George Moose], whose locked door on the fifth floor was forced open, were escorted by police from the building and prevented from reentering.
2. Use the Freedom of Information Act
Jason Koebler, co-founder of the tech site 404 Media, recently filed dozens of FOIA requests related to communications within federal agencies, in part to confirm if they are still being processed. He and his colleagues sought and obtained several memos that agencies were required to create to comply with Trump's anti-trans executive order. Koebler writes that "FOIA may indeed be a way to bring transparency and some semblance of accountability to an administration that has gutted the federal workforce and has attempted to evade public records laws." The team at 404 Media also created a series of videos for paid subscribers on how to file FOIA requests, and you can see the status of their FOIA requests over at MuckRock.
3. A troubling story can still be uplifting
CBS's "60 Minutes" told the story of DEI changes affecting the United States Marine Band, which had hosted a contest for teenage musicians to get a chance to play with them. A diverse group of thirty students were chosen, and a concert was scheduled — but it was abruptly canceled last month following Trump's anti-DEI executive order. After "60 Minutes" gathered the students for interviews, a new concert was planned for students to play with veterans from military bands, in front of an even more robust audience.
4. 'Symbols are not just symbols. They reflect the stories that people tell'
For The Atlantic, Clint Smith observed as construction crews tore down the Black Lives Matter mural from a two-block area in Washington, D.C., following threats from Republicans in Congress to withhold millions of dollars in federal funding if they didn't remove the mural and rename Black Lives Matter Plaza to Liberty Plaza. The mural was painted in 2020 following the protests over the police killing of George Floyd. Smith talked to one of the crew members assigned to the job:
I walked up to one of the workers holding a stop sign near an intersection. Antonio (he asked me to use only his first name because he wasn’t authorized to speak with reporters) wore a highlighter-yellow vest, his dreadlocks falling down his back from beneath his white hard hat. He told me he lives in Southeast D.C. and remembered feeling a sense of pride when the mural was painted. When he found out that he would be part of the team removing it, he asked not to be behind the wheel of any of the machines. “I just told them I don’t want a part in touching it,” he said, shaking his head. He looked over at the jackhammer pummeling the concrete on the other side of the street. “It was a memorial for the culture, and now I feel like something is being stripped from the culture.”
5. When you don't get an answer, keep asking
At The Present Age, Parker Molloy highlights a remarkable exchange between NPR's Michel Martin and Troy Edgar, deputy secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, following the arrest of Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil by ICE agents. Martin asks for clarity on why Khalil was arrested, and when Edgar doesn’t give a straight answer, she sticks with the question. As Molloy notes, it's a textbook example of "a journalist who simply refuses to move on until they get an answer... Martin pressed Edgar at least ten times to provide a specific example of what Khalil did that constituted supporting terrorism, and Edgar couldn't offer a single concrete example. Not one."
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Links of Note
- Elaine Appleton Grant, author of the excellent audio storytelling newsletter Sound Judgment, has a new series for podcasters on the essential elements of a winning pitch. She says that she struggled with writing the series, given the layoffs and upheaval in podcasting and media. "Storytellers are justifiably anxious," Grant writes. But another editor, Ruxandra Guidi, urged her to continue: "Learning how to pitch a good idea is timeless.” Grant also directs readers to a brand-new rate guide for audio freelancers, published by AIR (the Association of Independents in Radio), which reveals average hourly ranges by role. Pay transparency is timeless, too.
- Audio Flux, an experimental home for short-form audio storytelling co-founded by radio and podcast pioneers Julie Shapiro and John DeLore, is seeking 3-minute audio stories for its fifth "circuit." Submissions are due by April 1, and the theme is "In 3D." Their creative partner is writer, comedian and "3D photography enthusiast" Eric Drysdale, who also curates and hosts the Midcentury Stereopanorama experience. More details are available here.
- One final storytelling tip from author Matt Bell, who writes fiction, but his lessons can apply to narrative nonfiction as well. When he feels like his novels are too bogged down in exposition, Bell looks to the constraints of screenwriting to see where he can streamline. "For my purposes I’m basically trying to boil scenes down to three elements: dialogue, action, and image. That’s it. As I’m trying to render a story in screenplay format, I decided I can really only let myself advance the plot by one of those three items." If you’re thinking through how best to tell a story, I hope one of these strategies might point you on a new path.
Keep sharing your stories,
Mark Armstrong
Editor
Nieman Storyboard
On Bluesky: @niemanstoryboard.org
Send me your story, book, podcast, and documentary recommendations: editor@niemanstoryboard.org
