How to Clip and Report

Here are some of the do's and don't of how we can most effectively collect and manage the clippings from news articles and written notes from television and radio stories. While these suggestions may seem to be trivial on the surface, they are actually critical to our being able to classify and categorize the articles and information coming in for the Hate Crimes Clipping Project.

How to Clip and Report. Please make sure that you include the masthead or a written notation made outside of, and not written over the text – in the margins. We need the newspaper's name, city/town and date on each page that is clipped and mailed. This includes stories found on the Internet; if you send a story from the World Wide Web, also include the full web address (URL) on the printed pages. If you include more than one article and/or there is more that one page of text, please attach continuations to the article's first page. Please do not use tape because it pulls the paper apart; if staples are used, please staple in a non-text area (margins). Please do not use paper clips, for they inevitably come apart in the mail.

If you are making notes based upon a television or radio report/story that you heard, please make sure you include the name of the station, the city and the state of the broadcast, and if known, the name of the broadcast program, the announcer, and the date and approximate time you heard the report. This allows us to follow up to learn more details of the story.

Why the identification and details are critical. We are not familiar with the newspapers in each state. Therefore, for example, the Gazette newspaper article you send in might be from a number of states and/or a number of cities, towns or regions within the state. This is further complicated because often we do not have a return address for the trackers, and some of our trackers clip from various papers in different states. Sometimes trackers send us multiple articles at one time. Sometimes they are from both current papers and clippings that are a month or two old. We have noticed that sometimes you save articles up and mail them all at once. While we like to get articles that are current, we clearly understand the work and time that goes into preparation and mailing.

Similarly, for television or radio reports, we do not know the stations or the local affiliates of the major networks and the date the story aired.

Many of you include your name and address either on attached notes or as the return on the envelope. Some of you do not. If you prefer that we do not know who you are, this is fine, but whenever possible we really do want to know who is helping with this important work.

Again, our sincere gratitude for your participation in the Hate Crimes Tracking Project of the Women's Division and Ministries in the Midst of Hate &Violence of the General Board of Global Ministries of The United Methodist Church.

Please send articles and/or reports to the Women's Division, General Board of Global Ministries, Attn: Ministries in the Midst of Hate &Violence, The United Methodist Church, 475 Riverside Drive, Rm 1502, NY, NY 10115-0050.

Please send articles and/or reports to the Women's Division, General Board of Global Ministries, Attn: Ministries in the Midst of Hate & Violence, The United Methodist Church, 475 Riverside Drive, Rm 1502, NY, NY 10115-0050.

THANKS FOR YOUR HELP!

These materials were developed by The United Methodist Church's Ministries in the Midst of Hate & Violence in cooperation with the Center for Democratic Renewal.