NCEW Foundation is investing in the editorial writer's future: help out with contributions.

It's a new year, and NCEW and its Foundation face many old and new challenges. As this is being written, there is a lot of unpleasant news circulating about our industry. Many of you are experiencing firsthand the consequences of the paradigm shift in the communications business.

It is incumbent on NCEW, with support from the Foundation, to make this unavoidable passage as smooth as possible. The officers of both our professional organization and the Foundation have spent a lot of time trying to decipher what's coming and develop plans to assist our members into the new digital world.

The Opinion Pool Project, an effort to develop model approaches to plying the opinion trade in a world where there are several competing avenues for sharing ideas and information, is underway. We are seeking funding for The Opinion Pool from the Knight Foundation, which has generously supported NCEW in the past and continues to do so through its support for the Minority Writers Seminar. But in the meantime, the NCEW Foundation trustees decided at the December meeting to commit approximately $33,000 to cover the start-up costs for this project.

Last year, our members, some corporate friends, and foundations helped to make 2007 a record year for participation in fundraising activities. For a long time, I thought we needed to husband most of our money--waiting for that rainy day when the money would be really needed. The Foundation has regularly supported The Masthead, the Minority Writers Seminar, foreign and domestic trips, and, occasionally, a regional meeting, among other projects. Now it's time to face a big challenge: the future of the opinion business as we know it.

The Foundation trustees have made it clear as well that regional meetings will be supported with grants. Already this year one has been held, and three more are in the planning stages. What better way to spend your generous donation dollars than to help members and potential members to improve the work they do?

I mentioned that the Knight Foundation has been instrumental in sustaining the Minority Writers Seminar, which has brought a significant number of minority group men and women into the opinion profession in the past dozen years. Knight provided us with a five-year, $150,000 challenge grant to create a $500,000 endowment to run that important program. We are now entering our fourth year, and the goal is within reach. As of this writing, we need $145,000 to complete the match. It is my goal to meet that this year. I'll need your help to achieve that goal.

I've come to recognize that as president of the NCEW Foundation, I have to be a bit of a nag. It's my job to remind you that contributions must continue, if the Foundation is to continue its work. Those of us on both the NCEW and NCEW Foundation boards have tried hard to listen to what you have told us is important to you--what it is that you expect NCEW to provide. I believe we have responded as well as we could in the past few years. But just as I continue my call for contributions to the Foundation to increase, the demands of members increase as well. And we'll try our best to meet those demands.

Another major project of your NCEW Foundation is the highly regarded Beyond Argument, a thorough and informative guide to opinion writing, editing, and broadcasting. The first edition is history, of course, but two talented NCEW writer/editors, Barb Drake and Maura Casey, are now compiling the second edition. Some of the articles in the first edition have been revised, and new chapters are being added. With any luck it will be available in a few months.

Thank you for your continued support for the Foundation. Our ability to continue to provide members with the kind of professional educational programs they want and need is dependent entirely on how well the Foundation is supported.

John H. Taylor Jr., executive director of the Delaware Public Policy Institute, is president of the National Conference of Editorial Writers Foundation. Email: jtaylor@dscc.com