Collaborate · The Catalyst

Report the science of your city.

The Catalyst is written, edited and designed by students. If you keep asking how something works, and who in Washington is working it out, there is a place for you here: on the page, behind it, or out reporting.

Pitch a story Join the team

Our contributors study at George Washington, Georgetown, Howard, American, Maryland and Johns Hopkins. No experience in journalism required; curiosity is.

A pen-and-ink drawing of a student reporter's desk: an open notebook, a recorder and marked-up proofs by a window onto the U.S. Capitol.

How a story gets made

From a question to an edition.

Every piece in The Catalyst goes through the same four steps. You are never on your own for any of them: an editor works with you from the pitch to the printed page.

  1. The pitch

    Start with a question

    A lab down the street, a result you can't stop thinking about, a scientist whose path surprised you. Send us a few lines on the story and why it matters.

  2. The reporting

    Go and find out

    Interview the people doing the work, read the research, visit the lab. We help with introductions, questions and the tricky parts of explaining a field you are new to.

  3. The edit

    Work it with an editor

    Drafts go back and forth with an editor who reads line by line: structure, accuracy, clarity, the sentence that isn't quite there yet. Designers and illustrators take it from there.

  4. The edition

    Published, with your name on it

    Finished stories run in the season's edition under your byline, alongside the rest of the issue, and stay on The Catalyst for good.

The team

Every edition takes a masthead.

Writers are only part of it. These are the roles that put an edition together; pick the one that sounds like you, or tell us what you would add.

A pen-and-ink drawing of a long worktable laid out with a magazine team's tools: proofs, a layout on a laptop, a sketchbook, a camera and a microphone.

Get involved

Send us a line.

Pitch a single story, or apply to join the team. Either way, a person reads it.

  • Who reads itAn editor on the masthead, not a form processor.
  • WhenWe reply by email within about a week.
  • DraftsShare a link (Google Docs, Drive, Dropbox) with view access if you already have something written.

Google Docs, Drive or Dropbox, shared with view access.

Not contributing, but want to support us?Labs, organisations and partners can back the magazine at the close of every story.

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