As summer wanes, I’m gearing up for cooler weather (bleh) and football season (heck yeah). For freelancers with children, though, fall means back to school.

I can still feel in my bones the dread I felt on that last night of freedom before my alarm brutally woke me for the first school day of the year. Still, my spirits always perked up a little when I slammed my locker shut and headed to the spot where my friends and I always gathered before the first bell rang. 

We freelancers can capture some of that magic ourselves and use this season as an excuse to reconnect with our network of colleagues. Call or email an editor you haven’t worked with in a while to see if they need any pitches. Reach out to a colleague you admire to tell them how much you enjoyed something they wrote. Most importantly, check in on your friends in the business. How’s life treating them? Any new editor leads or interesting stories they’re working on? Excuses to collaborate? Maybe you can even propose a pitch feedback swap or a virtual co-working session.

Connecting with you all through this newsletter has kept me grounded during this challenging year of caregiving, as have calls with my favorite editors and chats with beloved friends and colleagues. 

I’m reminded of the Care Bears and their “Care Bear Stare,” which counterintuitively healed people and spread good through the world by shooting light from their stomachs, not their eyeballs. The Stare could be wielded by one bear, but the impact when they joined hands and forces was exponentially better. 

The same is true when we call upon our network: Good things happen not just for us but for those we tap. 

Who do you plan to reconnect with today?

~ Sara 

Soleil Ho has always had a lot of irons in the fire. For a decade, they worked as a chef while freelancing as a writer. In 2019, they joined the San Francisco Chronicle, where they served as the paper’s restaurant critic until 2025, nabbing a James Beard Award in the process. These days, when they’re not collaborating with chefs on cookbook projects, they’re helping to run COYOTE Media Collective, a Bay Area–based worker-owned newsroom. Ho shared candid insights and hard-learned lessons for the cooperative-curious with IIJ leader Shernay Williams and discussed their career as a food journalist. 

IIJ founder Katherine Reynolds Lewis heads to San Francisco for the annual Association of LGBTQ+ Journalists conference! Join her, COYOTE Media’s Soleil Ho, and Kae Petrin, co-founder of the Trans Journalists Association on Sept. 10 for a 11 a.m. PT panel on how to build a sustainable freelance career in today’s media landscape. 

At 6 p.m. PT, you can then join the IIJ for a free meetup co-hosted by the Association of Independents in Radio, the Fund for Investigative Journalism, and the International Women’s Media Foundation! Katherine, the IWMF’s Tat Bellamy-Walker, and FIJ’s Eric Ferrero will be on hand.

Join the fall 2026 cohort of the IIJ’s Business of Freelancing Course, taught by IIJ leaders Shernay Williams and Emma Carew Grovum! Over eight weeks, you will learn how to build an AI-proof professional network, develop time management and invoice strategies, how to determine your ideal hourly rate, and more. 

Capped at 30 participants, the course runs from Oct. 1 to Nov. 19. Register before Aug. 31 to take advantage of early bird pricing: Only $199 for eight weeks of transformative learning!

Our first webinar of the season is a delicious one! Register for “Dig In: How to Succeed on the Food Beat,” and learn how varied stories about food can be and how freelance journalists cover everything from culture to agriculture, recipes to history, science to social justice. Guardian deputy editor Cynthia Greenlee, Food Section founder Hanna Raskin, Ravenous worker-owner Jaya Saxena, and COYOTE Media Collective worker-owner Soleil Ho will share best practices for pitching them. Tomato, Tomato publisher Alicia Kennedy will moderate.

Registration opens Sept. 1. $30 gives you access to the recording as well as the live broadcast.

Be sure to listen to the latest Freelance Journalism Podcast episode with Soleil!

Join multimedia journalist and Religion News Association national reporter Fiona Murphy for “Storytelling in 60 Seconds” on Sept. 9 at 1:00 p.m. ET. She will recommend affordable equipment, discuss Adobe editing basics, and more. Register at: bit.ly/60SecondReporting

The Center for Cultural Innovation invites Bay Area journalists — especially those in Vallejo — to apply to write newsletters based on stories shared by local artists. 💰$15,000 budget. Applicants should email their resume and links to their work to Stephanie Imah at [email protected] and Will Tamurah at [email protected]. (h/t to Leo Aquino of Queer & Trans Wealth)

The New York Times is accepting applicants for a two-year editor residency for journalists with two to seven years of experience. The position is located in the newsroom in New York City. 💰$98,323.16 per year. Learn more and apply here. Deadline: Tuesday, Sept. 8.

The Poynter Institute invites journalists of color to apply for the 10th anniversary cohort of the Power of Diverse Voices workshop. The four-day workshop takes place from Nov. 10-13 in St. Petersburg, Florida. 💰Free tuition and some travel support. Learn more and apply here. Deadline: Friday, Sept. 18.

Wall Street Journal features editor Wilson Wong is always looking for pitches on fashion, internet trends, books, beauty, and more for the Real Estate, Style, and Lifestyle verticals, as well as the magazine. All ideas must have a clear business angle 💰$1 per word. Read Wong’s detailed pitch instructions here and send pitches to [email protected]. (h/t to Study Hall)

Truthout’s William Rivers Pitt fellowship provides emerging opinion writers the opportunity to write two to three quick pieces per week on political issues. 💰$2,000 per month for up to 6 months. Learn more and apply here. Rolling deadline.

📖 The Food Section’s Hanna Raskin has decided to fight AI-generated pitches the old-fashioned way: with a phone call. She tells NiemanLab about her decision to start a pitch line so that she can speak one-on-one with journalists about their story ideas. “I’m sure there is an AI way to game this system too,” she told Hanna´ Tameez. “But my hunch is it will work until it doesn’t.”

Ask Hanna more about her literal pitch calls at our Sept. 25 webinar!

📖 It’s easy to demonize people who write AI-generated pitches, but many of them are just trying to survive. For Dispatch, Phyllis Mwaura connected with writers based in Kenya who use AI to create pitches, and uncovered the human stories behind them. In a nation with 67% unemployment for those between the ages of 15-34, writers — and even one optometrist — say they use AI just to find some income and work. As one aspiring journalist told Mwaura, “I want to align with what [editors] want.”

📖 Movement journalism publications like Scalawag and Prism have seen philanthropic donations diminish significantly since the second Trump administration began. Such cuts impact both staff and freelance budgets and have compelled leadership to consider new pathways for raising funds. As Prism Editor in Chief Lara Witt told Uyiosa Elegon for the Columbia Journalism Review, “We did deal with the COVID years where philanthropy retracted a little bit, but this is different because it’s legal, it’s structural.”

🗓️ Thursday, Sept. 10 - Join the IIJ for a panel at the 2026 convention for NLGJA: The Association of LGBTQ+ Journalists in San Francisco! At 11 a.m. PT, Trans Journalists Association co-founder Kae Petrin, COYOTE Media worker-owner Soleil Ho, and the IIJ’s Katherine Reynolds Lewis will present a panel on “The Reality of Freelance Journalism Today.” 

🗓️ Thursday, Sept. 10 - Our freelancer meetup at NLGJA, co-hosted with AIR, the IWMF, and the FIJ, takes place at 6 p.m. PT. Come meet IIJ leader Katherine Reynolds Lewis, IWMF leader Tat Bellamy-Walker, and Eric Ferrero from the FIJ! Register here. 

🗓️ Friday, Sept. 25 at noon ET - Webinar - Dig In: How to Succeed on the Food Beat, featuring Guardian editor Cynthia Greenlee, Ravenous co-founder Jaya Saxena, the Food Section founder Hanna Raskin, COYOTE Media co-founder Soleil Ho, and moderator Alicia Kennedy, founder of Tomato, Tomato. Learn how these journalists have created unique career paths, and learn how to pitch their publications! Register starting Sept. 1 for just $30. Join the waitlist here.

🗓️ Thursday, Oct. 1 at 3 p.m. ET - The fall 2026 cohort of the IIJ’s Business of Freelancing course begins! Over eight weeks, IIJ leaders Shernay Williams and Emma Carew Grovum will teach you the core strategies and systems that will enable you to build a sustainable and fulfilling freelance career. Learn how to negotiate strong contracts, build a strong client network, and more. Register here for just $199 early bird pricing, but hurry! This price only lasts until Aug. 31! 

🗓️ Friday, Oct. 16 - The IIJ’s Ann Marie Awad will participate in an 11:30 a.m. ET panel on what to do if you’re laid off during the National Association of Science Writers virtual conference. She’ll be joined by freelance writers Alaina G. Levine and Elizabeth Pennisi, CNN Senior Science Reporter Kasha Patel, and Vita-Activa’s Luisa Ortiz Pérez.

🗓️ Friday, Oct. 16 at noon ET - Webinar - Global Freelancing: The Secrets of Traveling Entrepreneurs. Learn how to thrive as a freelancer abroad from seasoned digital nomads: journalists Tiara Darnell, Russell Nichols, Zerline Hughes Spruill and Saul O., founder of RemoteQueer. Register starting Sept. 1 for just $30. Join the waitlist here.

🗓️ Friday, Nov. 20 at noon ET - Webinar - Fund your Freelancing with Fellowships and Grants. Grab your share of the money funding freelance journalism from the Education Writers Association, Freelance Investigative Reporters and Editors, the Ida B. Wells Society for Investigative Reporting, and Trans Journalists Association. Learn what application reviewers are looking for! Register starting Sept. 1 for just $30. Join the waitlist here.

🗓️ Friday, Dec. 11 at noon ET - Webinar - Pitching Arts, Culture, and Travel Stories. Learn what it takes to land your next story in Condé Nast Traveler, Travel + Leisure, or Aeon Magazine in this session featuring editors from all three, hosted by IIJ leader Erika Hayasaki. Register starting Sept. 1 for just $30. Join the waitlist here.

🗓️ Friday, Jan. 22 at noon ET - Webinar - Winning Revenue Strategies for Creator Journalists. Join us for an inside look at the revenue strategies of successful creator journalists like Serena Maria Daniels of Midwest Mexican, Monique Madan of Two Can Be True, Garnet Henderson of Autonomy News, and Yashica Dutt of Featuring Dalits, in this session led by URL Collective’s Kirstin Garriss. Register starting Sept. 1 for just $30. Join the waitlist here.

▶️ COYOTE Media’s Soleil Ho on cookbooks, freelancing, and running a worker-owned newsroom

▶️ Podcast: From WaPo to Solo: Karen Attiah on being a "Modern-Day Warrior Philosopher"

▶️ Podcast: UT Prof Anita Varma on how freelancers practice “Solidarity Journalism”

▶️ Podcast: Learn From Editors’ live feedback on environmental pitches

▶️ Podcast: Journalist Kavitha Cardoza on covering education and poverty

▶️ Podcast: How to pitch unique NYC immigration stories to Documented