KERA’s Commitment to Serving and Representing Our North Texas Community
Public media belongs to you. All of you. KERA is committed to representing, including and celebrating the communities we serve. As a public service, KERA has a responsibility established by the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 to provide excellent and diverse non-commercial educational content for unserved and underserved audiences.
Our goal is to provide a culture of belonging – on-air, online and in the halls of our facilities, and our interactions with the communities that we serve.
OUR GOALS
In pursuit of its commitment to our North Texas Community, KERA has established the following goals:
– For all audiences to be reflected and included in KERA’s programming.
– For KERA’s staff to reflect the community it serves – including in positions of leadership.
– For KERA’s Board of Directors and Community Advisory Board to include representation that expresses our commitment to our community.
– For KERA’s news and public affairs content to include a range of experiences, identities, and perspectives in its reliable, independent and nonpartisan news coverage.
– For KERA to build and maintain strong, engaged relationships with communities across North Texas that rely on programming that is free, educational, and accessible to all.
– For KERA to cultivate and actively maintain a sense of belonging throughout the organization.
How we live up to our commitment…
Representation in KERA’s Content
KERA is committed reflecting the communities we serve in the content we provide. Effective storytelling relies on a wide variety of experiences. We are dedicated to being more participatory in terms of who is doing the storytelling and whose stories are being told. As required by the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967, we are committed to addressing the needs of unserved and underserved audiences. This includes active steps towards reaching audiences we haven’t engaged with before through different platforms which includes performing audience research to inform programming and event choices. We strive to earn trust by representing our communities authentically and elevating stories throughout the region we serve.
We also aim to produce original multi-media content that is educational, informative and “in the moment” — that reflects the issues, cultures and lives of residents of North Texas.
For example…
KERA’s partnership with The Dallas Morning News, Arts Access, is a journalism initiative with the aim of expanding local arts coverage through the lens of access, equity and the economy of the arts. Through this partnership, KERA and The Dallas Morning News provide more coverage for often-overlooked arts organizations.
KXT is also actively reaching new audiences through the launch of its Public Music Meetings. These ongoing public meetings invite listeners to meet with KXT hosts across North Texas and vote on new music they want to see added to KXT’s playlists. KXT has held Public Music Meetings in Plano, Richardson, Fort Worth, Dallas and Denton and continues to expand across North Texas.
KERA’s Education Team also continues to grow as a trusted partner for families, students, educators and programs across North Texas. The Education Team piloted its first Learning Neighborhood through the Ready to Learn Initiative that provides Community Learning workshops in an under-served community to advance critical early learning skills for children ages 2-8. They launched professional development opportunities for educators and librarians through PBS LearningMedia and held 46 Family & Community Learning Workshops and events across North Texas. KERA’s Kids Fest welcomed over 3,500 parents and kids to learn about the importance of giving back to the community.
KERA News has expanded its team and services to be more reflective of the entirety of North Texas, including adding Accountability Reporters in Dallas, Fort Worth, Arlington and Collin County. KERA also acquired The Denton Record-Chronicle, Denton County’s primary source of local news, and continues to sustain and grow that essential news source. In addition to Arts Access, KERA is also the lead station of The Texas Newsroom — a statewide collaboration between Texas public radio stations. Together, these stations share reporting between one another and also with NPR — providing both North Texas and the country with more Texas stories from Texan perspectives.
Reflecting the Community
KERA believes having a staff that is reflective of the communities we serve is crucial to fulfilling our mission to serve North Texans with public television, radio and multimedia resources that educate, engage, inspire, and entertain. KERA is an equal opportunity employer and is dedicated to creating a safe and healthy working environment that promotes belonging and connection.
Hiring and HR Procedures
We are committed to providing employment and promotion opportunities to individuals of all backgrounds, experiences, and identities. This includes focused recruitment to identify talented candidates who may not be represented in applicant pools. Our hiring processes are structured to include broad representation on hiring panels. We also believe in supporting long-term career development to prepare our team for leadership roles within the organization, in public media or at other organizations.
Further, KERA offers paid internship and fellowship opportunities to cultivate the next generation of public media professionals. We are committed to equity and transparency in compensation among our staff.
More information about our employment recruitment sources and efforts can be found in our annual FCC EEO Recruitment Report.
Belonging at KERA
KERA strives to create an environment of belonging that shapes how work gets accomplished with everyone’s contribution.
In 2023 we formally integrated belonging into our culture to ensure that everyone is included in all aspects of the workplace. We continue to actively do this now by:
Sharing a weekly People and Culture newsletter
Using our intranet to streamline internal communications
Hosting monthly All Staff meetings and an annual Team Appreciation Day
Developing new and evolving onboarding and hiring procedures
Putting a hard focus on belonging while working on an ambitious capital project
Working intentionally to coach and upskill our managers
Living into our Guiding Principles – which established the framework for how all employees work together to fulfill KERA’s mission. These principles include seeking growth organizationally and individually, effective collaboration, and welcoming new opportunities to grow and succeed working together.
UPDATED MARCH 2025
