The Objective is a nonprofit newsroom based in Ames, Iowa, that holds American journalism accountable for past and current exclusion, erasure, and prejudice in reporting and newsroom staffing. Founded in 2020 as a volunteer-run newsroom, it publishes reporting, first-person commentary, and reported essays on how journalism has misrepresented or excluded specific communities in coverage — and how newsrooms have treated staff from those communities. Independent, reader-supported, and written by and for people underrepresented in journalism, The Objective has become one of the leading outlets of media criticism in the United States, winning its first Institute for Nonprofit News (INN) Award in 2025.
Founding and Mission
The Objective was founded in 2020, created from a need to hold media outlets accountable for how newsrooms function and to push for more equitable reporting. Its founders saw that mainstream media criticism rarely centered race, exclusion, and power inside newsrooms — that media criticism and reporting had failed to hone in on how racism and exclusion in media isn't just a story, but the story.
The newsroom's stated mission is straightforward: "The Objective is a nonprofit newsroom holding journalism accountable for past and current exclusion, erasure, and prejudice in reporting and newsroom staffing." Its premise is a deliberate play on journalism's traditional ideal of "objectivity": major American newsrooms have called themselves objective for generations, but their coverage has always been defined by homogeneous teams that fail to account for race, gender, class, disability, and sexuality. Despite holding up objectivity as journalism's gold standard, major U.S. newsrooms have never consistently lived up to their promised ideals of fairness and impartiality.
The tagline on the site reads: "Every headline has a backstory. The Objective examines power and inequity in journalism — and how to make the field better."
Founders and Leadership
The Objective was founded as a volunteer-run newsroom in 2020, with co-directors Gabe Schneider and James Salanga leading the organization. Co-founder Marlee Baldridge has also played a central role, including handling writer recruitment and submissions. The co-directors went part-time beginning in summer 2024, a shift the organization announced alongside news of its INN Award win.
Gabe Schneider, co-director, has been a prominent voice on media criticism and newsroom equity, writing about how media reporting on race, gender, class, disability, and sexual orientation remains a rarity — often relegated to a passing mention or one-off story rather than treated as a theme running through media coverage. James Salanga serves as co-director and as the podcast producer for The Sick Times, a journalist-led newsroom covering long COVID.
Despite initially running a volunteer newsroom, The Objective has always sought to pay its writers — a commitment the organization has maintained even through its shoestring early years.
What The Objective Publishes
The Objective publishes reporting, first-person commentary, and reported essays examining how journalism operates. Its coverage is organized into categories including Language, Media Workers, Missing Coverage, and Provocations.
By September 2025, the newsroom had published more than 300 stories. Its reporting has ranged from coverage of the New York Times being cited 29 times to justify a Supreme Court decision limiting trans healthcare, to an investigation of Reveal laying off all Black unionized workers in 2023 after pledging "accountability."
The Objective also publishes "The Front Page," a weekly newsletter recapping the stories behind news headlines — examining power in the media industry and surfacing media criticism worth reading. The newsletter paused for a three-month break and relaunched with a new website, with the organization announcing that "our newsletters — including this one — are up and running again."
The INN Award-Winning Investigation
The Objective won its first Institute for Nonprofit News Award in 2025 for an investigation reported by Alexis Allison covering a New York City newspaper editor's years-long bullying. Allison's investigation, reported over two years, chronicled the experiences of nine employees — mostly women — who experienced bullying by a top editor, Michael Hinman, across hyperlocal New York newsrooms owned by Herald Community Newspapers. Despite seven years of reports to HR by sources and others, Hinman continued to be promoted.
After Allison's investigation was published, Hinman was suspended and subsequently departed from the publication. The award, given in the Breaking Barriers (Micro Division) category, recognizes reporting that "brought new understanding to an issue or topic affecting people or communities that are historically underrepresented, disadvantaged or marginalized, resulting in impactful change." A judge for the entry wrote: "Fantastic reporting on an often underreported issue. Bravo for getting the reporters to feel comfortable enough to share their stories with you and go on the record. Fantastic impact. Well done!"
The micro division awards newsrooms "exceeding expectations for their size." The Objective's co-directors noted that legal support from Lawyers for Reporters and fact-checking by Siri Chilukuri were among the many hands that made the story possible.
Awards Recognition and Finalist Placements
The 2025 win was The Objective's first INN Award, but not its first recognition. The newsroom's staff was previously chosen as a finalist for the Community Champion (Small Newsroom) award in 2022, for "our significant contribution to the well-being of [the] community." In September 2025, The Objective was named a finalist for two INN Awards in the same cycle — the investigation by Allison among them.
"We started The Objective because we saw the need for real change in journalism — not just in coverage and language, but to ensure newsrooms are run equitably, too," said Gabe Schneider. "We partner with journalists who have valuable stories to tell, but can't find a home elsewhere. This is one of those stories. Alexis' reporting shows both the importance of fighting for transparency in our field, and reconfirms exactly why The Objective exists: to make the journalism field a more equitable place for journalists and the communities we cover."
Writer Compensation and Submission Culture
The Objective's approach to writers is deliberately transparent about money and access. The newsroom pays $200 to $600 per piece, while openly stating it would like to pay more as funding improves and prefers honesty with writers about its capacity. It actively seeks pitches about systemic coverage issues within journalism and how the field can do better, and it welcomes first-time writers — stating that clips or writing samples can be as informal as a personal blog or class assignment.
Submissions go to submissions@objectivejournalism.org, and the newsroom encourages direct, clear headlines. This open-door pitching culture is part of its mission to be written by and for those underrepresented in journalism: lowering the barriers to entry that keep journalism's own media criticism a field dominated by the already-established.
Independence and Funding Model
The Objective describes itself as an "independent reader-supported nonprofit since 2020." As a member of the Institute for Nonprofit News, it operates within the nonprofit journalism ecosystem that has grown as a response to the commercial local news crisis.
The newsroom's focus on accountability journalism — investigating how other news organizations treat their own staff and cover marginalized communities — makes it unusual within nonprofit news: it is a watchdog for the watchdogs. Its journalism covers journalism with as much scrutiny as journalism covers other institutions of power and privilege, in its own formulation.
Audience and Community Impact
The Objective's audience is deliberately specific: journalists, editors, newsroom leaders, and students questioning whose voices are heard and whose stories get told. Testimonials from working journalists reflect its influence. Word in Black reporter Anissa Durham praised The Objective for "amplifying stories that would not otherwise be published ... and challenging the current structures in place." AAJA Voices fellow Khadeejah Khan described its coverage as "essential in this accountability" work of examining how power operates in newsrooms. Balestra Media president Christina DiPasquale called it "essential reading for anyone who wants to understand how power operates within our media system — and how to challenge, redistribute, and transform it."
Its coverage of industry-wide issues — from layoffs as newsrooms cut budgets and foundations shift priorities, to mainstream news media struggling to cover the rollback of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, to coverage of anti-trans policies — positions it as a record-keeper for journalism's own failures and course corrections.
Challenges and the Path Forward
Like many nonprofit newsrooms, The Objective has faced the precarity of small-scale independent media. It ran as a volunteer newsroom for its first four years before its co-directors could go part-time. It paused its newsletters for a three-month break before relaunching with a new website — a reminder of the resource constraints facing a newsroom built to critique the industry's resourcing.
Yet the newsroom has kept publishing, kept paying writers, and kept winning recognition. Its end-of-year roundups of the best media reporting and criticism — from coverage of Palestinian journalists reporting in Gaza, to historic labor victories like the NewsGuild's longest strike, to the return of the "Pulitzers" of prison newsrooms after a 35-year hiatus — serve as an annual statement of its values: journalism that centers power, equity, and the workers who make the news.
