T-Squared: Texas Tribune 2022 diversity report shows progress

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We’re proud to announce that The Texas Tribune has made major strides toward the diversity goals we laid out in our 2018 strategic plan, as we seek to ensure that our organization, from top to bottom, better reflects the people of Texas.

In 2022, 78% of our new hires were people of color.

And at year’s end, 49% of Tribune staff members overall were people of color, compared with 39% in 2021, 37% in 2020, 33% in 2019 and 30% in 2018. Women make up 57% of Tribune staffers.

Diversity is essential to our success, and we scour Texas, and the country, for talented people to join our team. Diversity — not just in race and ethnicity but also gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic background, disability status and age, among other characteristics — leads to better journalism. Journalists from different backgrounds offer a variety of perspectives on how we cover news and what we consider newsworthy. Those varied points of view help us better connect with and tell the stories of the diverse residents of Texas.

Our commitment to diversity doesn’t stop at recruitment and hiring. We have conducted a pay equity analysis and put checks in place to ensure our compensation remains fair. We survey our employees annually to keep learning and building in areas of inclusiveness and belonging in our workplace, and we’re working with Courageous Conversation, a firm that counsels organizations on racial equity transformation, on ways to improve. We are as committed to retaining our talent, through investments in training and career development, as we are to bringing in great talent.

Our long-established fellowship program has trained scores of journalists who now work in newsrooms across the United States. In October, we announced the launch of our new HBCU Fellowship, which will allow us to deepen relationships and recruiting at historically Black colleges and universities. Any student at a historically Black college or university in Texas is eligible, as are Texas high school graduates enrolled at HBCUs in other states.

Disclosure: Courageous Conversation has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.