NPR's Staff Diversity Numbers, 2019

In fiscal year 2019, NPR's newsroom makeup was just over 28% people of color and just under 71% white. Nearly 57% of the staff was female, according to newsroom staff diversity statistics provided, at the request of the Public Editor's office, by NPR's human resources department.

We've been tracking the diversity of NPR's newsroom staff annually in the nearly five years since I've been in the Public Editor role; usually the numbers provided are as of Oct. 31, but this year they coincide with the end of NPR's fiscal year, Sept. 30, 2019. My predecessors looked at the topic, too. As I wrote last year, "Having a diverse newsroom is crucial if NPR wants to tell stories that matter to an increasingly diverse country." And, "Numbers don't tell the whole story, of course, but they offer one way to keep NPR's progress (or lack of significant progress in recent years) front and center."

The shift toward a more racially and ethnically