The Open Notebook

The Open Notebook (TON) is a science journalism non-profit organization, online magazine, and publisher. Its purpose is to help science journalists improve their skills. It publishes articles and interviews on the craft of science writing and maintains a database of successful pitch letters to editors. TON also runs a paid fellowship program for early-career science journalists. The Open Notebook is supported by foundation grants and individual donations, and also partners with journalism and science communication organizations.

The Open Notebook
AbbreviationTON
Formation2010 (2010)
FounderSiri Carpenter
Jeanne Erdmann
Founded atMadison, Wisconsin
TypeNon-profit NGO
Legal statusCompany
Services
  • Publishes articles on science journalism craft and interviews with science journalists
  • Maintains database of pitch letters to editors
  • Offers fellowship program for early-career science journalists
President
Siri Carpenter
Jeanne Erdmann (Vice President and Secretary)
Alexandra Witze (Treasurer)
Shraddha Chakradhar
Ann Finkbeiner
Jane C. Hu
Ashley Smart
Websitetheopennotebook.com

Description

The Open Notebook was founded as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization by freelance science journalists Siri Carpenter and Jeanne Erdmann.[1]

Initially, its sole purpose was to publish "story-behind-the-story" interviews with journalists about the genesis and development of specific published pieces of science journalism. Subjects of interviews at The Open Notebook have included Rebecca Skloot, Kathryn Schulz, Ed Yong, Mary Heglar, Elizabeth Kolbert, Steve Silberman, Adriana Gallardo, Carl Zimmer, Ankita Rao, Nicola Twilley, David Quammen, Christie Aschwanden, Elizabeth Shogren, Natalie Wolchover, Seth Mnookin, Cynthia Graber, and Gabriel Mac.[2]

In 2011, Carpenter and Erdmann expanded the project to include a pitch database, an advice column, and articles on topics such as structuring narrative feature articles, finding and sharpening story ideas, taking good notes as a reporter, and pitching story ideas to editors.[3]

Knight Science Journalism at MIT wrote of the organization:

Since 2010, The Open Notebook project has been providing educational tools and resources to sharpen the professional skills of science journalists at all experience levels. It's home to detailed interviews with science journalists who dissect their own story-creation process, deep reported features on the challenges of the craft, "day in the life" features where science journalists share their habits and tricks, and even an advice column and a pitch database giving examples of successful feature queries.[4]

Gary Price of Library Journal said The Open Notebook "provides unique tools and resources to help science journalists at all experience levels hone their craft".[5] Spencer Davis of The Freelancer by Contently said TON's site "was built for science journalists in particular, but many of the site's resources are just as applicable to all freelance writers".[1]

Tara Haelle of the Association of Health Care Journalists wrote, "Perhaps the best science journalism site/blog out there is The Open Notebook, chock full of advice, tips, guides and inspiration." She listed the orgaization of topics on the site: "Breaking In; Finding Ideas; Pitching; Story Planning and Reporting; Writing Accurately, Clearly and Engagingly; Fact-Checking, Self-Editing and Revising; The Business and Economics of Freelancing; Being Part of the Science Journalism World; and Looking for Inspiration?"[6]

David Dobbs, writing in Wired, called TON "The wonderful shop-talk site for science writers."[7]

"...The Open Notebook [is] a primary resource for science journalists. It offers a primer on how to report and write about science, including how to read a scientific paper and how to explain complex concepts and processes clearly."

—Quill, A Magazine by the Society of Professional Journalists[8]

Articles on science writing craft

The Open Notebook publishes articles focused on elements of science writing and editing craft.[9] Topics include reporting on risk, reading scientific papers, covering preprint manuscripts, writing about disability, making freedom-of-information requests, being a science writer and managing a mental illness, finding and pitching stories to editors, negotiating freelance rates, and interviewing sources about trauma.[10]

The Open Notebook partnered in 2016 with the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing (CASW) to co-publish Storygrams, a series of annotated articles analyzing exceptional qualities of notable science stories.[11] Each piece in the series includes an in-depth embedded analysis of the story and an accompanying interview with its author. Undark summarized the project, "The Storygrams project from The Open Notebook aims to highlight what makes the best science writing stand out."[11] Articles examined through this series include works originally published in The New Yorker, The New York Times, National Geographic, Nature, The Atlantic, The New Republic, and other media outlets.[12]

Writer profiles

In the "A Day in the Life" series, The Open Notebook publishes brief profiles of working science journalists. In the series, writers and editors describe where they work, their favorite productivity and note-taking tools, their reading habits, and other aspects of their daily working routines. Spencer Davis wrote that the series "resembles the New York Times' s 'By the Book' column—which interviews famous personalities on their reading and writing habits—but with a focus on journalists".[1] Writers profiled through this series have included science journalists such as Maryn McKenna, Virginia Hughes, Nadia Drake, Amy Maxmen, Helen Ouyang, Anahad O'Connor, and Rhitu Chatterjee.[13]

Collections

The Open Notebook publishes several topical collections of articles on science journalism. Among others these include a collection of resources on diversity, equity, and inclusion in science writing.[14][15] The collection includes a resource page to assist journalists in finding diverse science sources and a collection of diversity style guides for journalists. It also offers the article series "Diverse Voices in Science Journalism," which is published in collaboration with the National Association of Science Writers (NASW) Diversity Committee.[16] The series has included articles on subjects such as covering indigenous communities, dealing with harassment from sources, including LGBTQ+ scientists as sources, navigating newsrooms as a minority, decolonizing science writing in South Africa, and working with a sensitivity reader.[10][17]

Pitch database

The Open Notebook's pitch database includes more than 200 successful pitch letters for news and feature stories to help writers gain better understanding of what makes a pitch most likely to succeed. Spencer Davis wrote, "Sections like the Pitch Database, which publishes successful pitches submitted by real journalists, can be extremely useful for figuring out what works and what doesn't."[1] When The Open Notebook published its first book, The Craft of Science Writing, in 2020,[18] some pitches from the pitch database were included in annotated form. In that piece, journalist Roxanne Khamsi pointed out well-executed elements of certain pitch letters, discussing what makes those elements important and that likely contributed to their success.

Early-career fellowships

The organization started a fellowship program in 2013 for early-career science journalists. Through this program, fellows report and write articles on the craft of science writing for publication at The Open Notebook. Some alumni of the program include Tina Casagrand, Tiên Nguyễn, Aneri Pattani, Julia Rosen, Christina Selby, Jane C. Hu, Rodrigo Pérez Ortega, Rachel Zamzow, Geoffrey Giller, Knvul Sheikh, Jennifer Lu, Shira Feder, and Katherine J. Wu.[19]

Spanish translations

In 2019, The Open Notebook began translating some of its reported features into Spanish. The TON en Español Spanish translation series includes articles such as reporting on preprint manuscripts, spotting shady statistics in scientific papers, solutions journalism for science reporters, and the shortage of Spanish-language science journalism in the U.S.[20]

Science Storytellers

In 2017, The Open Notebook became a partner with, and fiscal sponsor of, Science Storytellers, an organization that helps children interview scientists using tools of science journalism.[21] This organization, founded by science writer Jennifer Cutraro, operates booths at science fairs and festivals, including at the American Association for the Advancement of Science's annual Family Science Days and at the American Chemical Society's ACS Kids Zone event.[22]

Peeps science diorama contest

In 2019, The Open Notebook hosted the first annual science-themed Peeps diorama contest. The project was the idea of Helen Fields, Kate Ramsayer and Joanna Fields, who had participated in past Peeps diorama contests hosted by The Washington Post and other publications. From 50 entries, winners included dioramas depicting, in Peeps, NASA's Hidden Figures, a virology laboratory, the National Museum of Natural History, and other scientific themes.[23][24]

Contributors

Contributors to The Open Notebook have included writers such as Nadia Drake, Ed Yong, Carl Zimmer, Laura Helmuth, Kendra Pierre-Louis, Sharon Begley, Tasneem Raja, Michelle Nijhuis, Anil Ananthaswamy , Melinda Wenner Moyer, Shraddha Chakradhar, Tom Yulsman, Olga Kreimer, Roxanne Khamsi, Brooke Borel, Mara Hvistendahl, George Musser, Azeen Ghorayshi, Sandeep Ravindran, and Charles Seife.

Funding

The Open Notebook is supported by individual contributions and by grants from charitable foundations. TON's early-career fellowship program is supported by the Burroughs Wellcome Fund.[25] The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation has supported TON's story-annotation from series a grant to CASW as well as other TON programs.[12] TON's Diverse Voices series is supported by Science Sandbox, an initiative of the Simons Foundation.[26] In 2020 The Open Notebook announced that the Kavli Foundation would support development of a series of email mini-courses. Funding from the Therese Foundation helps support development of topical collection, and The Open Notebook has also received funding from the National Association of Science Writers and the Knight Science Journalism program at MIT, which said on its site, "It's a fantastic resource for science journalists, whether they're veterans or greenhorns".[4]

Selected publications
  • Carpenter, Siri, ed. (2020). The Craft of Science Writing: Selections from The Open Notebook. Madison, Wisconsin: The Open Notebook, Inc. ISBN 9781734028003.[27][28]

See also

References
  1. Davis, Spencer (May 5, 2016). "The Open Notebook's Siri Carpenter Reveals What She Looks for in a Pitch". The Freelancer. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  2. "Interviews Archives". The Open Notebook. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  3. "Our Mission". The Open Notebook. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  4. "The Open Notebook". Knight Science Journalism @MIT. Retrieved July 15, 2020.
  5. Price, Gary. "Journalism: Reference Tools: The TON Pitch Database". LJ infoDOCKET. Retrieved July 15, 2020.
  6. Haelle, Tara (December 11, 2018). "Dive into a treasure trove of articles at The Open Notebook". Association of Health Care Journalists. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  7. Dobbs, David (January 22, 2013). "How David Quammen Gets The Goods: An Interview". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  8. "Excerpt: Tips on organizing notes from "The Craft of Science Writing" : Quill". Retrieved July 11, 2020.
  9. Amer, Pakinam (May 20, 2020). "Working Scientist podcast: Science communication made simple". Nature. doi:10.1038/d41586-020-01526-y.
  10. "Reported Features Archives". The Open Notebook. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  11. "How to Diagram a Great Science Story". Undark Magazine. June 6, 2016. Retrieved July 10, 2020.
  12. "TON and CASW launch "story diagrams" series | Council for the Advancement of Science Writing". www.casw.org. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  13. "A Day in the Life Archives". The Open Notebook. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  14. Hayden, Erika Check (October 24, 2019). "More Inclusive Science Journalism Is Better Science Journalism". Undark Magazine. Retrieved July 11, 2020.
  15. Yong, Ed (February 6, 2018). "I Spent Two Years Trying to Fix the Gender Imbalance in My Stories". The Atlantic. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  16. "Diversity Fellowship recipients announced". www.nasw.org. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  17. "Diverse Voices in Science Journalism". The Open Notebook. Retrieved July 17, 2020.
  18. "A new science writing anthology offers lessons for any journalist covering a complex world". Nieman Storyboard. Retrieved July 12, 2020.
  19. "The Open Notebook Fellowship". SciComm Board. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  20. "The Open Notebook". Pew Research Center's Journalism Project. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  21. "Partners". Science Storytellers. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  22. Hassler, Claire (February 28, 2020). "What journalistic process can teach both kids and scientists". Nieman Storyboard. Retrieved July 11, 2020.
  23. "This Peeps Science Diorama Contest Makes the Classic Easter Candy Educational". Food & Wine. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  24. Wu, Katherine J. "Poo-Sniffing Peeps, Miss Ameripeep and More Emerge Victorious in #PeepYourScience 2020 Competition". Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  25. "10th World Conference of Science Journalists | Burroughs Wellcome Fund". www.bwfund.org. January 19, 2018. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  26. "Supported Projects". Simons Foundation. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  27. "The Craft of Science Writing". www.goodreads.com. Retrieved July 9, 2020.
  28. Wai, Jonathan (April 23, 2020). "What Scientists Can Learn From Science Writers". Psychology Today. Retrieved July 9, 2020.

The Open Notebook

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