Minority numbers are growing in television and radio news, according to the Radio Television Digital News Association’s annual survey. Newspapers, though, continue to show weaker minority hiring numbers, and minority hiring still lags population percentages.
According to the survey results, the latest RTDNA/Hofstra University Annual Survey finds the percentage of minorities is up a full percent in television from a year ago — and even more in radio. The percentage of minority news directors also went up in both television and radio. And the percentage of minority news directors at non-Hispanic TV stations set a new high mark — for the second year in a row.
The survey also determined as far as minorities are concerned, the bigger picture remains unchanged. In the last 22 years, the minority population in the U.S. has risen 10.4%; but the minority workforce in TV news is up 3.7%, and the minority workforce in radio is up 0.9%.
Fox affiliates, at 28.2%, had a higher percentage of minorities than the others (as they have in the past), and NBC affiliates, at 17.4% continue to trail ABC and CBS stations — as they did last year. Other commercial stations, at 57.7%, were at the top, and noncommercial stations, at 3.8%, brought down the overall percentage. Stations in the West and South were the most diverse; stations in the Northeast and Midwest had minority percentages around half the South and West.
The 2012 survey by the American Society of News Editors (ASNE) found that minority journalists make up 12.3% of newsroom employees at daily newspapers. That’s down 0.5% from the 2011 number … which was down 0.5% from 2010.