Engaging Journalists in the Sports X Climate Conversation: FFF and Minute Media Workshops
Football For Future (FFF) and Minute Media, a leader in digital sports journalism, partnered to launch a series of workshops designed to raise awareness of climate change and positively influence attitudes & behaviours towards environmental sustainability amongst football media.
These workshops aimed to educate writers, editors and content creators from Minute Media brands including 90Min, The Players Tribune and FanSided on the fundamentals of climate change and empower them to incorporate this into their work in football media and beyond.
Since the workshops in early 2022, Minute Media has published 590 content pieces on climate and sports, which to date have reached 14,000 views.
The training was split into two parts.
Part 1 included: an introduction to climate change, the relationship between football and climate change, and a contextual view of current affairs and the climate movement.
Part 2 covered: an interactive session discussing journalists’ sport x climate content pitches as well as tips and tricks for reporting sport and climate change (messaging values; experts & fact-checking organisations; and a calendar of events).
Some highlights include:
Football’s Climate Conversation: A podcast series promoting the latest stories in the sector, with guests including Robbie Savage (Leicester City, Wales), Joe Cole (Chelsea, England), and Katie Cross (Pledgeball).
An interview with two-time Olympic champion and world record holder Eliud Kipchoge.
#SavingSport, a new Minute Media impact initiative.
The percentage of participants who had a “very good” or “excellent” understanding of climate change more than doubled from 41% to 89% - and the % of participants who were “likely” or “very likely” to include climate change in their reporting also quadrupled from 20% to 88%.
As an early workshop in the history of FFF, this project also represented a significant milestone in our growth, since we’ve delivered over 50+ workshops and reached over 1000 players, staff and organisation members. We’re grateful to Minute Media for their support on the journey.