Claude skills for journalism, media, and academia
A curated collection of Claude Code skills designed for journalists, researchers, academics, media professionals, and communications practitioners.
Docs site: jamditis.github.io/claude-skills-journalism — interactive skill browser, setup guides, and full documentation.
Guides
Setup and workflow guides, separate from the skills themselves:
| Guide | Description |
|---|
| Persistent sessions | Keep Claude Code sessions alive through disconnects using tmux — setup, key bindings, activity notifications, and scheduler coexistence |
What are Claude skills?
Skills are modular instruction sets that extend Claude's capabilities for specialized tasks. Each skill contains domain-specific knowledge, workflows, templates, and best practices that Claude loads automatically when relevant to your work.
Installation
Prerequisite: You need Claude Code installed. Run claude --version in your terminal to check.
Plugins (recommended)
Plugins give you slash commands you can run directly inside Claude Code. Run these two commands in your terminal:
claude plugin marketplace add https://github.com/jamditis/claude-skills-journalism
claude plugin install pdf-playground@claude-skills-journalism
Then restart Claude Code (close and reopen). See the PDF Playground README for detailed setup instructions and troubleshooting.
Available plugins:
| Plugin | Description | Commands |
|---|
| pdf-playground | Create branded proposals, reports, one-pagers, newsletters, slides, and event materials with an interactive control panel for live design editing (colors, fonts, spacing, sections) and a guided wizard for proposals | /pdf-playground:proposal, /pdf-playground:report, /pdf-playground:onepager, /pdf-playground:newsletter, /pdf-playground:slides, /pdf-playground:event, /pdf-playground:preview |
Skills (manual installation)
Skills load automatically when relevant to your work. To install them, clone this repo into your Claude skills directory:
git clone https://github.com/jamditis/claude-skills-journalism.git ~/.claude/skills/journalism-skills
Or copy individual skills:
cp -r source-verification ~/.claude/skills/
For Claude.ai users
Skills can be added via the Claude.ai interface under Settings > Skills.
Skills overview
Core journalism skills
| Skill | Description |
|---|
| source-verification | SIFT method, digital verification, reverse image search, social media account analysis, building verification trails |
| foia-requests | Public records request drafting, tracking systems, appeals process, state-specific guidance |
| data-journalism | Data acquisition, cleaning, analysis, visualization, and storytelling for newsrooms |
| newsroom-style | AP Style enforcement, attribution rules, headline formatting, number conventions |
| interview-prep | Pre-interview research, question frameworks, recording consent, attribution guidelines |
| interview-transcription | Recording workflows, transcription, quote management, source databases |
| story-pitch | Pitch templates for daily news, features, investigations, op-eds, and freelance queries |
| fact-check-workflow | Claim extraction, evidence gathering, rating scales, correction protocols |
| editorial-workflow | Story assignment tracking, deadline management, editorial calendars, handoff protocols |
| crisis-communications | Breaking news protocol, rapid verification, crisis response, misinformation countering |
| social-media-intelligence | Social monitoring, narrative tracking, account analysis, coordination detection, OSINT |
Communications and publishing
| Skill | Description |
|---|
| newsletter-publishing | Email newsletter creation, subscriber management, deliverability, A/B testing |
Design and production
| Skill | Description |
|---|
| pdf-design | Professional PDF reports and proposals with brand system, budget tables, and multi-page layouts. For the full interactive experience, use pdf-playground instead |
| visual-explainer | Turn complex data into styled HTML pages — architecture diagrams, data tables, flowcharts, timelines, source maps, and dashboards with dark/light theme support |
Writing quality
