{"id":4637,"date":"2018-09-07T18:03:41","date_gmt":"2018-09-07T18:03:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ona18.journalists.org\/speaker\/vignesh-ramachandran\/"},"modified":"2018-09-07T18:03:41","modified_gmt":"2018-09-07T18:03:41","slug":"vignesh-ramachandran","status":"publish","type":"ona_speaker","link":"https:\/\/ona18.journalists.org\/speaker\/vignesh-ramachandran\/","title":{"rendered":"Vignesh Ramachandran"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Vignesh is a founding member of ProPublica Illinois, the nonprofit national news organization\u2019s first regional investigative newsroom.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy focus is on how our storytelling presentations and visual tone can be developed to build our presence in Illinois and cater toward the unique needs of our local audience,\u201d he says. \u201cWe are inherently experimental \u2014 and an experiment ourselves \u2014 taking ProPublica\u2019s national investigative model and scaling that to the state level.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Those experiments, he says, include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Building a visual voice that is distinctly \u201cIllinois,\u201d and not just a midwestern stereotype. To do this he has commissioned photos and illustrations from Illinoisans across the state.<\/li>\n<li>Teaming up with colleagues to create visual standalone versions of investigations optimized for low-bandwidth mobile devices. An example is an investigation into Illinois\u2019 Department of Children and Family Services which has been holding children in psychiatric hospitals beyond medical necessity.<\/li>\n<li>Experimenting with editorial illustration, such as thematic representations, explanatory visuals and literal subject depictions. <\/li>\n<p>As the first regional ProPublica site, Vignesh says he hopes their initiatives will help create a model for subsequent local operations.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI believe sharing our experiences and exchanging visual ideas with the wider journalism community can help us all expand our audience reach,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<p>The MJ Bear Fellowship Selection Committee said: \u201cWith sharp editorial judgement and a strong sense of community, Vignesh&#8217;s skills as a visual journalist position him to make an exciting impact on ProPublica Illinois. We expect his work in the next year to develop a visual voice that is distinctly \u2018Illinois\u2019 and to focus on mobile platforms for storytelling to set a high standard for ProPublica Illinois and hope that his willingness to experiment and play continues to flourish.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Said his recommender Louise Kiernan, editor-in-chief of  ProPublica Illinois: \u201cVignesh has worked across our newsroom to commission more than a dozen photographers and illustrators to help tell (stories) visually. He brings to that task a commitment to hiring people who reflect the diverse communities and cultures of our city and state, which has strengthened the work and helped establish our organization as one striving for accurate representation. Vignesh also initiated and leads our newsroom mentoring project with young aspiring journalists from Chicago\u2019s West Side.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Prior to his current position at ProPublica Illinois, Vignesh was managing editor of Stanford\u2019s local news startup Peninsula Press in Palo Alto., and a founding member and journalism program manager for the Stanford Computational Journalism Lab.<\/p>\n<p>He is a graduate of the University of Colorado where he received a bachelor of science degree in Broadcast News Journalism and of Stanford University where he received a Master of Arts degree in Journalism.<\/p>\n<p>Vignesh also contributes to the Stanford Open Policing Project, an interdisciplinary effort to help researchers, journalists and policymakers investigate and improve interactions between police and the public.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":4635,"template":"","meta":{"start_time":0,"end_time":0,"moderators":[],"hashtag":[],"soundcloud":[],"scribble":[],"viafoura":[],"youtube":[],"vimeo":[],"facebook":[],"trint":[],"slideshare":[],"livestream":[],"resources":[],"video_embed":[],"first_name":"Vignesh","last_name":"Ramachandran","title":"Web Producer","organization":"ProPublica Illinois","website":"https:\/\/www.vigneshr.com\/","twitter":"vigneshR","_sponsor_url":"","_sponsor_tagline":"","_sponsor_level":"","spay_email":""},"event":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v15.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Vignesh Ramachandran - ONA18<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/ona18.journalists.org\/speaker\/vignesh-ramachandran\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Vignesh Ramachandran - ONA18\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Vignesh is a founding member of ProPublica Illinois, the nonprofit national news organization\u2019s first regional investigative newsroom. \u201cMy focus is on how our storytelling presentations and visual tone can be developed to build our presence in Illinois and cater toward the unique needs of our local audience,\u201d he says. \u201cWe are inherently experimental \u2014 and [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/ona18.journalists.org\/speaker\/vignesh-ramachandran\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"ONA18\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/onlinenewsassociation\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/ona18.journalists.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/16\/2018\/09\/Vignesh-Ramachandran.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1027\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1150\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@onaconf\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@onaconf\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" value=\"Written by\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" value=\"Brian Duff\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" value=\"Est. reading time\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" value=\"2 minutes\">\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ona18.journalists.org\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/ona18.journalists.org\/\",\"name\":\"ONA18\",\"description\":\"The 2018 ONA Conference &amp; 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