Reports
Mayor reshuffles top team after councillor Adam Clarke's resignation
Two new faces join the Leicester mayoral team after Councillor Adam Clarke quit.
Contribute
Write for us, get some work experience, or volunteer your time.
Write for us
We accept pitches from both established freelancers and new writers. Your pitch should be short, outlining the story's importance and why you are the one to write it. Keep it brief, well-structured and exciting.
How to write the perfect pitch
- Paragraph one: Set up the story – What's the context? Why is it important?
- Paragraph two: Newsy hook – what makes the story timely?
- Paragraph three: My angle, who I plan to interview, what else I plan to research.
- Paragraph four: Who I am, why I'm well-placed to write the story, link to my portfolio.
Credit: journalism.co.uk
What we're looking for
- Investigations
- Solutions-focused features
- Current affairs and local politics
- Human-interest stories
- Arts & culture features
- History features
- Voices (Comment/Opinion)
- Photoessays
- Podcasts
- Fiction and poetry
- ...and much more!
Things you should consider before pitching
Your story should be:
- About Leicester — we're a local newspaper
- About people and communities
- Relevant and timely (but not breaking news)
- Accessible to everyone.
You should also:
- Challenge the current situation
- Use original research and interviews
- Highlight positivity and solutions to problems
- Check if and how we have previously covered the topic at The Gazette.
How much we pay
We pay £125 per story. Every year, we conduct a review of our commissioning rate based on our budget and the rates offered by similar newspapers.
Work experience
We offer aspiring reporters the opportunity to experience local journalism first-hand.
Placements differ, but your job may include writing an article, contributing to our newsletter, participating in different editorial activities, asking lots of questions, and learning skills needed in local journalism.
Our work experience placements usually last two weeks, and we take on people all year round. Work experience is unpaid and voluntary — although we pay our commissioning rate for any feature articles written during your time with us.
Anyone can apply, regardless of ability or educational background.
You may be required to travel around Leicester as part of your assignments.
Volunteering
We have a dozen volunteers who come from all walks of life and lend a hand in many different ways.
They write the newsletter, take photos, and share our posts on social media. Some help with admin and leafleting, some provide support during our events.
They all help The Gazette grow. We help by increasing their skills in areas like writing, photography, film-making, social media, and more.
Our volunteers tend to meet every week on Thursday at The Gazette's community newsroom meeting, but some choose to work remotely.
If you would like to volunteer with us, please do get in touch.
