Where do article ideas come from?

For the story I am currently reporting, I looked into a local organization called Tompkins Pollinator Pathway (Clare Shanahan)

Writing and reporting about the environment is something I love to do, anyone who knows me will tell you that. For my next story in Ithaca Week, I am reporting on native plants and pollinators in Tompkins County. Specifically, I am focusing on an event co-hosted by Tompkins Pollinator Pathways and Grow Wild Native Plant Garden. As I was working on this story, a friend asked me how I find stories and that got me thinking; How do I find stories?

First, let’s back up to my last piece, which came to me through a classic avenue: social media. This time, it was social media with a twist — or at least a twist to me. I found the post on the Ithaca subReddit, a platform that I rarely check and was very surprised to learn people are so active on. I think an important element of finding story ideas is to think not just about where I might post my complaints or excitement about certain events, but where my audiences and sources may be active as well. This time it was the Ithaca subReddit, next time it might be a local Facebook group or Instagram stories.

Another thing that allows me to easily generate story ideas is to have a broad beat that I am passionate about. For the story I am currently reporting, I really just knew I wanted to do a story on pollinators and/or native plants. With that in mind, I started generating every Google search I could think of: “Pollinators finger lakes,” “pollinators Ithaca,” “Pollinators Tompkins County,” “butterflies Ithaca,” “native plants ithaca,” “native plants tompkins county,” “pollinator garden,” “grassroots native planting,” “Cornell native plants,” “Cornell botanical gardens” etc. Once these searches started returning interesting results, I dug deeper. Typically, this is looking into organizations, experts or programs to find timely news hooks. In this case, I was most intrigued by a program called Tompkins Pollinator Pathways, and once I dug into the program I found their newsletter and their events calendar and that is where I got to the story I am now elbow deep in.

Generating story ideas can be hard, especially on a regular basis on the same topic. The biggest thing that makes this process easier is simply getting started and establishing a database of regular resources. I am subscribed to as many local environmental newsletters as I can find, I also stay up to date with these organizations on social media and regularly check their websites' event calendars to find new projects and events. And lastly, I keep my ears open and make note of any issues, events, research etc. that stand out to me. This may all seem obvious to a seasoned story-finder, but it might help someone and so it is worth writing about. How do you find stories and events that interest you?