The Media Trust provides open courses, bespoke training, productions, and a community newswire service to help charities, communities, and citizen journalists engage with media. A case study example describes how the Dr Hadwen Trust used the community newswire service to publicize summer research grants for students, resulting in 98 news articles in one day highlighting the positive impact of the non-animal medical research. The document provides tips for conducting case study interviews following a three-act structure of introducing the initial conflict or problem, the solution provided, and the positive outcomes that resulted.

1. Suchandrika Chakrabarti
Community Newswire Manager
Media Trust

2. Positive change through the power of media
• Open courses- Regular training sessions on marketing, digital and PR
& media relations led by industry professionals
• Bespoke training and consultancy – Expert-led. tailor made
training and consultancy packages to meet the individual needs and
requirements of your organisation
• Productions – Award winning films for charities
• Community newswire – Our free-to-use Community Newswire
service helps charities, communities and citizen journalists get their
stories into the national and regional media

3. Engaging with Erasmus Plus UK
On Facebook On Twitter
@erasmusplusUK
facebook.com/ukeras
musplus

4. A case study is an interview with a
happy client

5. DHT Case Study
The Dr Hadwen Trust gives out studentships for summer research
Story: The Dr Hadwen Trust, a non-animal medical research charity, gave grants to students to
help them in their groundbreaking medical research over the summer.
Usage: Daily Mail, The Star (Sheffield), Peterborough Today, Yorkshire Evening Post, South
Yorkshire Times, Wakefield Gazette, Sheffield Telegraph, The Rutland Times, North
Yorkshire News, Malton Mercury, Worksop Guardian, Brighouse Echo, Thame Today,
Northampton Chronicle and many more. The stories gained 98 pieces of press in a day!

6. DHT case study as promo

7. Be prepared
• After choosing the right subject
and story for your needs, make
sure you do your research on
them
• Keep in mind a list of questions
structured along
problem -> solution -> result
• Opt for face-to-face or phone
interviews rather than email

8. Get the specifics
• Make sure you have a photo / video of them and / or their
organisation benefitting from your service
• Highlight any numbers, percentages or other positive stats
• Keep it conversational, but keep it on track

9. Get good quotes
• Your main aim is to convey your subject’s
enthusiasm for your service
• Any opinions should be in their voice, and ideally
any statistics too
• Always end with “Do you have anything to add?”

10. Three acts:
->Conflict
->Solution
->Outcome

11. Beginning: Conflict
• An introduction to your subject and
why they came to use your service –
due to a problem, a shortfall, some
other somewhat negative reason
• Did they have specific needs? What
were they?
• Consider using a standfirst (bold
paragraph between headline and body
text) to summarise the story and get
the key benefits in there at the start.
Look at news stories like the one on
the right for inspiration

12. Middle: Solution
• Share the steps the subject took to
overcome the problem, such as
considering organisations / ideas –
helps the reader empathise
• How / why did they find and choose
you?
• How did you help?
• Pitch your service or project here, blow
your own trumpet!
• Be honest about any problems that
arose

13. End: Outcome
• This is a summation of the positive effects
your organisation had upon the subject
• Read the case study through before
writing the conclusion
• Get in as much tangible evidence as you
can: statistics, pageviews, sales, anything
that quantifies the effect you had. Make
sure you get them in without too much
jargon
• How is the subject doing things differently
now?
• Do they have any advice?

14. Then tell the group which details
you remember from your partner’s
story