Transcription Specialist, Digital Democracy

CalMatters/The Markup seeks someone experienced in transcription who believes in the power of journalism and civic engagement to strengthen democracy and wants to use their skills to make a real difference in people’s lives.

If that person is you, you’ll have an exciting opportunity to work with the latest technologies and top collaborators to help journalists, hold governments accountable, and encourage civic engagement. The Digital Democracy project at CalMatters is one of the nation’s most advanced applications of artificial intelligence to journalism and civic engagement. It includes an unprecedented database and real-time capture of data that helps journalists identify stories in state government. We started with California, expanded to Hawai’i, and are now headed to Texas, Connecticut and other states. 

In this role, you’ll work with the Transcription Manager to prepare and process legislative video and data for our team of transcribers. This detail-driven role requires a self-motivated individual capable of managing independent workflows to ensure accurate, high-quality records. You’ll review legislative hearings to pinpoint and log specific bill discussions, clean text to streamline the transcription pipeline, and assist with end-to-end transcription of legislative proceedings.

We are looking for someone who is experienced in the following areas:

• The legislative process in any state, but particularly in places like Texas.
• Data tagging, metadata categorization, and data cleanup.
• Familiarity with transcription processes, style guides, and speech-to-text tools.
• Quality assurance, copy-editing, or proofreading text for high accuracy.
• Coordinating workflows or reviewing the output of a small team.

You would ideally also bring some or all of these qualities to the role: 

• Experience with databases and running SQL queries.
• Familiarity with AI speech-to-text translation software or data pipelines.
• A background in public policy, legal studies, or political journalism.

This full-time position with benefits is represented by the Pacific Media Workers Guild. This role is remote and requires occasional travel to our Sacramento office and to San Luis Obispo, where Digital Democracy was developed and where some on the team are based. Our preference is for you to live in California, but we will consider other U.S.-based candidates.

Compensation and Benefits
The salary range for this position is $75,000 to $95,000 per year. We offer a complete benefits package with medical, dental and vision insurance — we cover 95% of the cost for employees and dependents — from a range of HMO and PPO providers. We offer a 401(k) match program and provide life insurance at no cost.

The salary range above is our best estimate, in good faith, of what we expect to pay for this position. Our final salary figure will take into account the candidate’s experience and skills, as well as our commitment to pay our staff equitably.

How To Apply
If you’re interested, provide a resume and work samples. In lieu of a cover letter, please answer the questions below.

We believe strongly in personal and authentic engagement in our recruitment process and want to hear from you. We ask that you answer these questions yourself without the aid of AI or other automated tools.

Please do not contact the hiring manager or other staffers directly. If reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, don’t hesitate to contact [email protected]

CalMatters is committed to becoming an antiracist organization. We are an expanding and collaborative newsroom, successfully forging a new model for sustainable, intelligent, nonprofit journalism. We do our best to center justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion in all that we do—of which hiring is just one part. We encourage you to ask us about what concrete steps we are taking in service of these ideals. We strongly encourage applicants who are people of color, LGBTQ, and people with disabilities, regardless of national origin, alienage, and/or former incarceration status. 

A college degree is not required.

About CalMatters

CalMatters, now in its eleventh year, is an award-winning nonprofit, nonpartisan news venture dedicated to explaining the policy and politics of America’s biggest state and the world’s fourth largest economy. In 2024, we merged with The Markup, a nonprofit national news organization that challenges technology to serve the public good.

We produce vivid, original multimedia journalism, data-driven news analyses and watchdog accountability reporting on calmatters.org and themarkup.org and distribute our work at no cost to more than 250 media partners. Our success metric isn’t clicks. It’s impact. We serve millions of people through a variety of products. For example: 

• More than 1 in 5 California voters head to the polls informed by CalMatters’ nonpartisan Voter Guide. 
• Blacklight, our real-time privacy inspector, has been used over 10 million times and helped journalists, nonprofits, and academics hold tech accountable. 
• Digital Democracy, our unprecedented, custom-built AI tool, tracks everything you’d want to know about state legislators. It has unearthed stories and prompted legislators to call for change. 

We also have the most diverse major newsroom in California. Here you’ll be working alongside dozens of experienced people in a supportive, collaborative atmosphere.