Newsroom Developer

Newsroom Developer

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel/jsonline.com, part of the USA TODAY NETWORK, is hiring a newsroom developer to dream up, design and develop storytelling experiences that help readers connect with and understand important stories — like our Dairyland in Distress series, COVID-19 

tracker and exploration of Milwaukee home styles.

 This is a key role that serves our entire newsroom. You might be asked to build a scraper to assist with a reporting project, while independently reporting and building your own visual storytelling project. The next week, you might be leading the development of our election results pages.

 A background in news is not required, but an enthusiasm for journalism’s mission and willingness to dig in and do world-class work is key.

This is a newsroom that thinks big, pushes the envelope and has long punched above its weight, including on digital storytelling. Past people in these roles have won some of the top prizes in journalism and gone on to work for places such as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post.

Responsibilities:   

• Build and maintain new forms of journalism and digital stories and features.
• Maintain and improve newsroom tools and applications.
• Manage data, including scraping it, cleaning it, analyzing it and interviewing it to find and tell stories.
• Collaborate with journalists across teams to generate ideas on how to best visualize and tell stories.
• Document workflows for building graphics, tools and interactives.
• Learn and share new tools and ways of doing things with colleagues.

Requirements:

• Bachelor's or master’s in communications, journalism or an equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Experience designing and developing polished interactive graphics or databases from scratch.
• An understanding of good design principles and how to design for clarity and impact.
• Experience creating interactive maps.
• Experience with data, whether it’s collecting hard-to-get data off the internet or cleaning and analyzing data in your tool of choice, such as Python, SQL or R.
• Fluency in web development including HTML/CSS and JavaScript, and the libraries that go with it, like D3.js, Svelte and Mapbox GL JS.
• Experience with back-end languages like Node.js or Python.
• Experience with building APIs and web services.
• The ability and flexibility to work on several projects at once that draw on different skills. You’ll need to stay organized and focused.
• The self-discipline to work independently, as well as an eagerness to work with teammates on collaborative projects.
• Experience deploying applications hosted in AWS or similar cloud environments.
• Employment is contingent on passing a pre-employment, post-offer drug screen and background check.

Application Instructions:

We know not everyone will have all the skills listed. If you’re on the fence about applying, please do! You’ll be joining a team that values continued learning and experimentation and will give you support to grow in this role. 

We are eager to learn more about you and how you fit this role. When you apply, don’t limit your upload to a resume; show us what you’ve done. To do so, put together a single document file that includes the following, in this order:

1. Your resume – one to two pages.
2. A cover letter that outlines how you would approach the job.
3. Links to 3-6 online samples of your work. Show us what you’ve produced or had a hand in that best reflects what you can do in your desired role.

It is important that these items be assembled into a single document and uploaded in PDF format. Completing these steps will ensure that your application receives the highest consideration.

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