Supporting early-stage news founders is the most important mission for Tiny News Collective, so we’re excited to announce our very first membership director: Andrea Faye Hart. She will join the team officially on June 5 and will be in charge of our entire membership experience, including recruitment, application and selection, as well as managing member training and services. 

Hart is an award-winning media-based organizer and educator who most recently served as chief strategy officer for the Memphis-based MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, helping the organization grow its budget to $2.4 million. Previously, she was a co-founder and director of community engagement for City Bureau, a Chicago-based civic journalism lab. She also has a master’s of divinity from Vanderbilt Divinity School and describes herself as a “proud queer Quaker.”

“At the heart of my work there has always been a collective of audacious dreamers kindred to the TNC network,” Hart said. “I feel honored to co-conspire with founders who are willing to transform local news and information ecosystems while upending inequity in the industry. Here's to helping a million community-driven, community-centered and community-led experiments in media making. May we all be the better for it!" 

Hart will join the Tiny News team at an auspicious moment, as we look to grow our membership while providing diverse founders with the support they need to thrive in reaching underserved and underrepresented communities across the United States. 

“We are thrilled to have Andrea join our team to help us serve our existing members, find and nurture many more early-stage news startup founders and dream big about our role in the field,” said Amy L. Kovac-Ashley, executive director of Tiny News Collective. “Her experience in digital news innovation in Chicago and Memphis are a perfect fit for helping TNC founders in their journey toward financial sustainability.”

Welcome to the team, Andrea! ❤️