Fast-track your career in journalism with this 15-month intensive advanced journalism leadership programme at our flagship newspaper. Start as an Editorial Assistant trainee, progress to Deputy Editor and leave as Editor.

About the role

Finding stories

• Visit a plethora of tiny community groups, many with people with English as a second language and most of whom have no online presence eg email is not an option and stories have to be found in person
• Build relationships with local charities, campaigners, pressure groups, and social enterprises to report on their work
• Pound the pavements to visit local shops, businesses and community centres
• Speak to strangers on the street to gather public opinion and get the view of the everyday person
• Immerse yourself in social media – we find a lot of stories on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Next Door

Creating content

• Interview people, from the local shop owners and ‘local celebrities’, to marginalised people who are sharing personal and sometimes difficult experiences such as mental health, injustice or discrimination
• Write articles in a range of styles, from factual news to human interest stories and light listicles
• Edit work from our contributors
• Manage and build our content calendar ensuring we meet our content strategy and create timely content
• Source and manage our reader competitions
• Produce our weekly newsletter using Mailchimp

Social media management

• Optimise and share our content across social media networks including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram
• Manage our online communities, starting conversations, responding to comments and moderating the Facebook groups we manage
• Create unique photographic content for social media platform
• Come up with ideas for and help manage our social media collaborations with other titles/brands/bloggers to extend reach
• Develop our video and audio content

Optimising content

• Oversee production and quality control of the website, applying best practice on page SEO
• Build a network of reciprocated links
• Help repurpose and refresh evergreen and cornerstone content
• Use analytical tools to track performance of web content, newsletters and social channels and work with the editor to make improvements and inform strategy
• Analyse our data to create monthly performance reports for every platform (website and social media platforms)

Skills required

• A passion for local community! You will be able to see the extraordinary in the ordinary and have the drive to seek out stories from hard-to-reach groups
• A people person – you will need to be a people person, able to strike up conversations with strangers and build trust and empathy with people from diverse backgrounds
• A head for seo. You will also need to be comfortable dealing with data, optimising content, understanding hashtags, cross-linking, alt tags for images, writing metadata and building powerful URLs
• An eye for visuals. We create inspiring images that elicit pride and empathy. You’ll have an eye for Instagram worthy posts.
• Be an ideas person We are helping develop a new model of sustainable community journalism that no wonder else has done. You will need to keep abreast of what others are doing and be willing to try new things.

About the programme

This 15-month programme is designed for people at the beginning of their journalism career who are interested in attaining senior journalism jobs such as Senior Writer, Features Editor or Editor.

Duration

The programme is 15 months long, starting in September and ending in December of the following year.

Months 1-3

The programme starts as a three-month traineeship that acts as a handover from the previous alumna and an opportunity to familiarise yourself with the area and Social Streets’ systems and workflow. Your title will be Editorial Assistant Intern. During this three-month traineeship , you’ll be working a four-day week from Tuesday to Friday.

Months 4-10

Following a successful review, you will be promoted to Deputy Editor where you will work closely with Editor-in-Chief Tabitha Stapely on more advanced journalism skills and training including commissioning, editing, SEO, content strategy and reporting. From this point on, you’ll be working a five-day week on PAYE.

Month 11

August break. Offices close for three weeks.

Months 12-15

On return from our summer break you will be promoted to Editor. During the final three months, you will be responsible for training the next incumbent, providing you with hands-on experience of managing and nurturing the new recruit.

Pay Structure

The three-month training is paid at £50 per day. During the following 12 months, you will move onto a PAYE salary and receive the equivalent of £23,300 per annum, which is the London Living Wage for 2023. However, £3,000 of this overall salary is payable upon completion of the programme, which means your salary will be £21,300 for the 12 months.

Working arrangements

Five days per week. Mondays are worked remotely to review learning.

The hours are 9am to 5.30pm. Occasionally, you will be expected to attend evening and weekend commitments.

The office is based in Bow, London. Monday is remote and Tuesday to Friday is office-based.