MAKING FOIA WORK: THE METHODS AND DESIGN BEHIND OUR INVESTIGATION INTO GUN PROCUREMENT IN MASS

BY BINJ ONLINE

Almost a year ago, our team at BINJ began working with Emerson College’s Department of Journalism, MuckRock, and the Engagement Lab on a multipart public information-driven collaborative investigation into weapons use and procurement in Massachusetts. A project of the Online News Association’s Challenge Fund for Innovation in Journalism Education, it was administered by ONA with support from Excellence and Ethics in Journalism Foundation, the Robert R. McCormick Foundation, Knight Foundation, the Democracy Fund, Rita Allen Foundation, and the Scripps Howard Foundation. Thanks to all of them for making this possible.

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In which BINJ editorial project guy Chris Faraone breaks down the deep dive into firearm procurement we have been doing with @muckrocknews and the @emersoncollege @engagelab on a grant from @online_news. We were thrilled to see such a great turnout at today’s first-ever #Transparency #science #fair for #SunshineWeek. #media #journalism #engagementjournalism #engagement #policemilitarization #policeaccountability

A post shared by BINJ MOBILE (@binjmobile) on Mar 16, 2019 at 2:29pm PDT

Though we have kept readers updated throughout the process, sending out alerts for new articles and several engagement events that were part of this experiment, now we have a single convenient clearinghouse for all of the material we produced—from links to features in English and Spanish, to a detailed Participatory Design Process Book. You can check it all out and read more about the project at the links below.

Project Site

Medium Release

Story from MuckRock

Story from Emerson Today

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