Throughout her career, King has centered community engagement and outreach.

Not just through her reporting but also through leadership and project management.

As a reporter, King goes into underserved communities, some of which feel left behind and ignored by local journalists, and builds trust. She talks to leaders and every day people and helps to tell their stories.

Here are some other ways she strives to build community and engagement around local news.

Columbus Storytellers Project

King was the director for the The Columbus Storytellers Project, part of the national Storytellers Project. She led a team of coaches and coordinated live storytelling events featuring five speakers.

As part of this, King planned, promoted, organized and hosted two live events in 2022 with more than 250 attendees. She chose and coached the talent from a group of 70 applicants who she found using her deep community connections.

King also promoted the event, trained coaches to work with the talent and coordinated a rehearsal before it took place. She also managed a team of eight people to coach the storytellers and did event planning and promotion, including site booking.

Watch all the stories here.

Columbus Dispatch’s Mobile Newsroom

As a leader for The Dispatch’s mobile newsroom project, King made it a point to go right to the communities where the people she covers live. She set up shop in a Hilltop library branch for more than a month to find and share the stories of the people who live in that neighborhood.

The Dispatch published articles that would have never otherwise been told, including one about a beloved tae kwon do instructor and another about the lack of quality preschools, with less than 10% of children enrolled. Her work and presence there built trust in a community whose members shared that they had previously felt ignored.

Columbus Journalists in Training

Columbus Journalists in Training is a program that works with local high school students, pairing them with professional journalists to teach them the basics of journalism and help them produce an article, podcast or video.

Columbus Dispatch reporter Danae King (left) and Spectrum News anchor-reporter Tonisha Johnson lead a workshop about their reporting as journalism professionals and students from various Columbus City Schools participate in the Columbus Journalists in Training seminar on Sat. Feb. 18, 2023 at Fort Hayes Career Center. (Photo by Doral Chenoweth)

In the first year of the program, 2023, King mentored student journalists and helped them create articles, videos, photos and podcasts. She also spoke about her reporting as a special guest.

During the second year, King helped the leaders to determine and develop programming, coordinate the team of journalists and edit and post student content.

Columbus Dispatch reporter Danae King teaches as journalism professionals and students from various Columbus City Schools participate in the Columbus Journalists in Training seminar on Sat. Feb. 18, 2023 at Fort Hayes Career Center.

The Columbus Dispatch’s Summer Internship Program

King co-led a group of eight staff members, including editors, to conduct the Dispatch’s summer intern program for two years in 2023 and 2024.

She managed the group as it accepted applications, narrowed down applicants, conducted interviews, selected final candidates and then throughout the summer while interns were on-site. King worked with universities to get applicants, accepted and organized applications, corresponded with more than 50 applicants and planned and scheduled the interview process.

Students and instructors participate in the Columbus Journalists in Training class.

She also hosted and led meetings and events, coordinated mentors for 4-6 interns, managed those in charge of intern programming and did onboarding for interns. King also collaborated with editors about interns’ assignments. During her time leading the program, it grew from four to six summer interns.