Our Mission

Mosaic aims to teach journalism skills to youth from underserved areas and groups; to diversify the ranks of professional journalists, and to cover the news in our community. Mosaic works to amplify the voices of student journalists and fill the gap in news relevant to young people, immigrants, low-income families, and residents of East and downtown San Jose.  Our mission has become more urgent as local media capacity has eroded. 

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For three decades, the Mosaic Journalism Program in San Jose has focused on training underserved teens in journalism skills and empowering them to write about and photograph the issues important to them. Mosaic now offers three programs: 

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1. Summer Program -  Our intensive three-week summer workshop is held at San Jose State University. The session includes lessons in reporting, interviewing, writing and photography — and most important, learning by doing. Students pitch story and photo ideas and set out to work on them, coached by instructors. They produce a 12-page broadsheet paper and post stories and photos on our website and on the Mercury News’ online Mosaic page. Professional journalists volunteer to teach and run the workshop. Read published articles here.

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2. School-year program - Our school-year program offers our summer alumni the opportunity to continue covering the news and build their journalistic skills.  Learn more. 

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3. Teacher support program - Our staff offers mentoring and material support to high school journalism teachers and classes. In 2023, we provided cameras to the staffs of two student newspapers.  

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Mosaic alumni have gone on to work for the nation's top newspapers, online sites and other news outlets. Many more have entered successful professional careers in the public, private and non-profit sectors, aided by the skills and confidence they gained during the Mosaic workshop. Read more about our alumni here. 

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We depend on donations to offer our high-quality program to educate and inspire future journalists! We thank you for your support.