Media Committee
Committee Leadership
Editorial Chair: Annis Pratt
Social Media Chair: Matt Leese
The Media Lever at CCL is meant to help share information about climate issues, news, and actions across media platforms. Engage with local media to inform your community and legislators about CCL and build support for the Energy Innovation Act and a price on carbon.
Easy Ways to Help
There are many ways that you can help in the Media committee, and some of them require very little effort or time, maybe only a few minutes. Please email us if you are interested in helping with any of the items below!
- Follow CCL on social media and share content online often.
The best place to start with social media is to follow CCL and share the content that is already provided there.
- Follow and engage with Members of Congress and advocates.
Follow your members of congress and climate scientists, economists, and advocates on social media and engage with their posts. Keep information flowing between those who are in-the-know on climate change and our law makers. Click here to see the list of members of congress with links to their social media pages.
- Participate in Tweet Storms and other immediate actions.
Every once in a while, CCL encourages members to post messages on social media to congress, the president, or other specific purposes. Keep an eye out for announcements on social media and via email from CCL national or various groups. These may also be included in the Monthly Actions Community Bulletin. To help inform CCL about which platforms are most used by volunteers and to get signed up to receive Tweet Storm notifications, fill out this Great Lakes CCL Volunteer Social Media Survey.
- Watch for LTE (Letter to the Editor) opportunities and notify others.
If you're not interested in writing a Letter to the Editor but happen to see an opportunity for one, share it with the group!
- Create social media content.
Although CCL National does a great job creating new content for the organization, messaging and visuals are often still needed for working on a local level with our members of congress. If you like to write or have an artistic inclination, help out by creating some new content for the chapter to use!
- Write a Letter to the Editor (LTE) for a local newspaper.
Are you skilled with words? Try your hand at writing a Letter to the Editor. They should be brief (250 words or less) but still be able to express your thoughts as it pertains to a carbon fee as a viable solution to climate change. If you feel good about submitting something, submit your LTE via CCL's online tool. Need some help writing one? Click here to see a collection of resources to get you started.
- Help others learn how to use social media effectively.
Are you pretty savvy with social media? Let us know and we might be able to connect you with other members who could use some help.
- Share content via Reddit.
Do you use Reddit? Subscribe to the climate subreddit or other climate-related pages to engage with others who share our climate concerns.
Want to use Twitter but don't have a profile yet?
Click here for a couple of brief training videos on setting up a Twitter profile and sending a Tweet (~13 minutes)
More Ways to Help
Interested in getting more involved? Below is a list of more involved tasks that are handled by CCL's Media Lever, along with links to many helpful resources to get you started. If you want to contribute to any of these areas but want some help getting started, let us know!
Editorial Media
- Write Letters to the Editor (LTEs) and Opinion Editorials (Op-Eds)
Submitting multiple LTEs (Letters to the Editor) on one topic increases the chances that one will be published. Writing individually with some fellow CCLers on Zoom makes it fun, and if you submit your LTE using our online tool (cclusa.org/lte), it will be logged automatically.
Here are some ways to get started:
Email Jim Rine (jimrine22@gmail.com) to be added to metro Detroit's LTE newsletter and be updated on articles that would be great to respond to!
Join CCL's Writers Circle Action Team, a place to get peer support for writing letters to the editor (LTEs), op-eds, or other writing to support CCL’s efforts.
Take a look at LTE Topic Ideas, a resource to help volunteers write letters to the editor (LTEs) about climate change, climate policy and CCL's work.
Use CCL's Op-Ed Templates, which includes resources to help volunteers publish a longer piece in their local newspaper about CCL's work and the type of carbon pricing policy we support.
Review past Published Media on this page where CCL keeps track of the published letters to the editor, op-eds, editorials, coverage pieces, and articles that volunteers have published in newspapers, TV, and radio. This resource highlights a list of these recent pieces on CCL's webpage.
When you're ready, submit your LTE via CCL's online tool.
This resource contains a collection of training modules on the following topics:
This resources contains a collection of training modules to help you learn how editorial boards work, how to generate news, and tips on being interviewed. Topics include:
Social Media
- Join Action Teams
CCL has tons of Action Teams available to join, but there are two specific to handling social media on a national level and a state level:
Social Media Action Team: Join CCL's Social Media Action Team, a group of volunteers looking to share CCL's message on their social media accounts and also discuss creative social media campaigns. This group is primarily active on their Facebook group.
MI Social Media Team: A group for coordinating and amplifying social media communications in Michigan.
- Review and Utilize Social Media Toolkits for New Posts
CCL provides up-to-date resources for specific hot topics as well as general topics and what kind of messaging would be best to share on social media for each, with both provided content and help to develop your own content. Here are some of the topics:
Energy Innovation Act: Social media actions focused on H.R. 2307, the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act
Top Weekly Reconciliation Actions: Social media actions to take RIGHT NOW to support a #PriceOnCarbon in Budget Reconciliation
Carbon Pricing is Popular: A list of the individuals, where graphic and/or video files are located with their statements, and then the social media posts made by CCL’s official accounts.
Far Middle: The Far Middle is a new brand campaign from CCL. It brings one of CCL’s brand promises, “being nonpartisan,” to the forefront.
Fundraising: This resource features a live document link to the toolkit that will provide you and your connections with graphics, videos, and suggested post language to share on your social media for CCL's latest fundraiser.
A collection of training modules to help you get started using Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Topics include:
A collection of training modules to help you learn how to use social media to connect with media outlets and amplify your media hits. Topics include:
Hashtags
Below are some recommended hashtags to use in social media posts:
#GrassrootsClimate
#PriceOnPollution
#BipartisanClimate
#ClimateChange
#CarbonTax
#ActOnClimate
#ClimateStrike
Sample Messaging
The science is clear and we need to act. Join @citizensclimate to pressure Congress to put a #PriceOnPollution!
Files & Assets
To-Do List
We have a collaborative project within a Todoist account for delegating tasks. Currently, this list is only accessible to a select few collaborators.