Annual Report
A detailed overview of our achievements, funding and future direction.
A note from News Decoder Board President Christian Henry on our 2023–24 report:
“As we enter a transformative year, I want to share my deep gratitude to each of you — our supporters, educators, correspondents and talented students — for your commitment to our mission of informing, connecting and empowering young people across the globe.
Our community exists because our founder, Nelson Graves, felt a spur to action 10 years ago: he realized that young people do not yet see themselves within the collective story we call news. What might it look like to take action and inspire others to do the same? You have rallied around Nelson’s vision, with meaningful impact.
Through partnerships with 23 schools in 14 countries, in 2023 and 2024 we provided hundreds of students with hands-on practice in multimedia storytelling, digital literacy and investigative reporting.
For many of those in our program, this is a first chance to produce insight about something they care deeply about. For others, they are pitching a story and getting published — and what stories they are! From a young reporter investigating support for immigrants seeking asylum in New York City, to banned books in Mississippi, to an exploration of whistleblowers and who is worthy of press protections in Europe, their voices are examples of how to exercise civic responsibilities through journalism.
The challenges we invite our students to undertake are not only academic. The algorithmic realities of our media ecosystem play on emotion and promote the fringe, amplifying polarization and conflict that won’t yield to facts alone. How are we equipping young people to navigate the uncertainty ahead — for society, for the business models around news and for the durability of the common good?
The call for young people to find their voice and take agency for shaping their future has never been more urgent or important, and it continues to be our guiding purpose.
To serve that ambition, we aim to build community, enhance dialogue across our network and engage in partnership. As in years past, our resilience will continue to be tested: many schools who seek our partnership cannot afford to underwrite the full cost of our services. These difficulties for all news and educational programs are not unique to us, nor a deterrent. We aim to expand our partnerships with schools in the next two years by two-fold, while making a deeper impact where we’ve already engaged. We aim to strengthen our community of educators and help them develop their craft.
By extending the collaborations we’ve fostered with grantmakers to underwrite nearly 500,000 euros worth of programming these past three years, we are able to multiply your vital support — through a gift, as a correspondent or simply sharing our mission — which fuels our work and transforms our lives.
Your engagement in our community today defines our future together. I look forward to hearing from you.”
— Christian Henry
