Like most newspapers, the Harvard Press organizes its reporting by beats, specific topic areas, agencies, and people.
The Press has seven: Local government, including finance and public works; education and the schools; crime and public safety (police, fire, ambulance, courts); health and the environment; community life and events, including arts and culture, religion, and personality profiles; sports and recreation, including high school sports; and business and the economy, including housing, farms, and Devens.
Although Press reporters are general assignment reporters, able to respond to breaking news on a variety of topics, we each have our beats and in the course of covering them have found sources—documents, data, and people—who can help us get our facts straight and provide context and points of view on a given story. Familiarity with a topic and ongoing relationships with sources can lead to quicker access to information and exclusive stories. A Press reporter is rarely an expert, but we know where to find the expertise we need.
As we look to the future of the paper, we are mindful that our mission of keeping residents informed and of holding our elected and appointed officials accountable requires reporters with an intense interest in municipal government, who find excitement in probing budgets, breaking down 100-page reports, interviewing the people behind them, and then explaining what they’ve learned to readers, in words, illustrations, and photographs—or other media.
We are on the lookout for reporters who can continue our award-winning coverage of town government, including town administration, the Select Board, Planning Board, Finance Committee, Capital Planning and Investment Committee, and Community Preservation Committee—any committee that handles taxpayer dollars.
If these topics strike a chord, we’d love to talk with you. Please register online for our November information session and let us know of your interest in these areas.
Legendary Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward has been credited with the phrase, “Democracy dies in darkness.” Press reporters are Harvard’s spotlights.
