The PBS NewsHour will receive the Chairman’s Award at this year’s News and Documentary Emmy Awards.

The program is being honored for its contributions to broadcast journalism, but it is also helping lead the digital transformation of news and information.

In fall 2009, the PBS NewsHour launched in a new format that merged its broadcast program and digital platforms. A 2007 grant from Knight Foundation had helped the program add interactive graphics and media to its web site. The grant also helped build the site’s educational features, which include teacher resources and student-produced content.

The Online NewsHour now features an online-only video correspondent and a news blog called The Rundown. The site integrates content from other correspondents’ blogs and web sites, such as Making Sense with Paul Solman and Jeff Brown’s Art Beat. It also collaborates with other public media content producers like Frontline and NPR.

Knight Foundation also supports Patchwork Nation, a multimedia project with the PBS NewsHour that uses demographic data to identify different community types and trends across the United States.  In the coming years, the project’s analysis of congressional districts will help programs like the PBS NewsHour report on state-wide elections.

Robert MacNeil and Jim Lehrer, the original co-anchors of The MacNeil Lehrer NewsHour, will accept the Chairman’s Award at Lincoln Center on Sept. 27. They will be joined by Les Crystal, the president of MacNeil/Lehrer Productions, and NewsHour Executive Producer Linda Winslow.

As in-depth investigative reporting from daily newspapers has fallen, not-for-profit news models providing that coverage are rising.

This week on The Diane Rehm Show, “Not-for-profit Journalism” looked at how non-traditional news creators are becoming the new news providers. Rehm’s guests were Bill Buzenberg, Executive Director of the Center for Public Integrity; Stephen Engelberg, Managing Editor of ProPublica; Evan Smith, CEO and Editor in Chief of The Texas Tribune; and Ken Doctor, author of 'Newsonomics' who spent 21 years with Knight Ridder.

All three news organizations are supported by Knight Foundation. The Texas Tribune is rapidly gaining audience for its statewide model. The Center for Public Integrity is transforming digitally to better serve new audiences. And Pro Publica is the winner of a 2010 Pulitzer Prize.

Knight Foundation’s $15 million Investigative Reporting Initiative demonstrates the foundation’s commitment to developing new economic models for investigative reporting. See the grants from the initiative here.  In 2009, the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities highlighted the need to maximize “the availability of relevant and credible information. Its second recommendation is to “Increase support for public service media aimed at meeting community information needs.

The Knight Foundation’s Journalism Program funds a range of projects and ideas to advance quality journalism and freedom of expression worldwide.