Project Optimist receives $100K grant from McKnight Foundation
The funding will support Project Optimist in 2024 and 2025.
Newsletters Archive
53 posts
Bonus issue: Welcome new friends! Help us celebrate! And lessons from St. Cloud prairie restoration.
A St. Cloud church with a 15-acre prairie planted seedlings in 2022 that didn’t take off. Other plantings have worked. Here’s what we learned.
After school shooting, former greater Minnesota principal creates HuddLUp to help emotionally isolated kids
HuddLUp, created by a former principal in Cold Spring, Minn., focuses on building connections among students through play.
Support Project Optimist this Leap Day
"It's been more than three months now since I started, and I have to say I'm excited to get up and get to work every day," writes managing editor Jen Zettel-Vandenhouten.
What's a green burial and why is there a moratorium on these new cemeteries?
Minnesota paused ‘green burials’ because of a bitter fight over a cemetery in Carlton County. It has led to questions of religious freedom
The research and story behind Project Optimist
Jobs for news analysts, reporters and journalists are expected to decline another 9% from 2021 to 2031, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Have you ever seen the elusive 'hummingbird moth'?
What does it take to bridge political divides? Lessons from organizers in western Idaho
Happy Independence Day!
Greetings! Nora here. We're at the heart of summer now. I hope you're enjoying time off this week for July 4th (and maybe a few extra days too!). If you're hungry for some Project Optimist content, please explore our website. We switched things up
How relationships and trust can bridge political divides
Book excerpt this week from Dr. Corrie Grosse's 'Working Across Lines'