Virtual Training: Water Journalism Academy 2020 – Middle East & North Africa

To foster water and sanitation reporting in the MENA region, the regional program Energy Security and Climate Change Middle East and North Africa (KAS – REMENA) together with cewas invite 40 journalists, bloggers, content creators, youtubers, social media influencers and media professionals to the first virtual Water Journalism Academy – Middle East and North Africa.

The Regional Program Energy Security and Climate Change Middle East and North Africa (KAS – REMENA) of the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung and crews have joined hands to involve and work with media enthusiasts to engage in in-depth reporting on pressing water and sanitation matters across the MENA region.

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Outstanding environmental journalists and media professionals will be selected to take part in a tailored program with the goal of intensifying and improving the quality and scope of media coverage of acute water-related challenges in the country of implementation and region.

The program comprises a four-module training and co-creation workshop bringing together media professionals with key stakeholders of the water and environmental sectors on constructive water reporting, follow-up coaching, and regional competition, the Blue Peace Open Eye Award, that will award the production of innovative media pieces that make a meaningful contribution to improve water management across the region.

Agenda

The course will use a participatory, cross-institutional and interdisciplinary approach. The workshop program places a great emphasis on participants’ interaction: besides virtual lectures, group work and case studies, exchange with water sector experts and peer support in stimulating group exercises reveal creativity and challenge participants to think in a holistic way.

To achieve the workshop objectives, sequences of exercises and inputs will be organized to:

• map water and sanitation topics and put them in relation to target groups and adjacent sectors: This will allow developing a more profound understanding of the water sector, its complex interlinkages with other spheres of life and eventually to establish the relevance of water for different target audiences. This mapping provides the initial content overview to identify and tailor meaningful water stories.
• develop a concept and package a water story that makes a difference: Based on the resulting map, participants will synthesise their understanding of target audiences in audience profiles for a specific topic they want to work on. Based on the design thinking approach, they will develop innovative reporting formats tailored to these audiences. The different content elements will equally be identified through user-centred exercises and finally a research approach will be developed for each story.
• secure validation through feedback from journalists and experts: The participants will be tasked to identify ways to improve the concepts of their media pieces both format and content wise. For this purpose, direct consultations with a panel of water sector experts and sessions to facilitate peer to peer feedback will be organized. The feedback will be used to develop a work plan to finalize and publish the story in time for the Blue Peace Open Eye Award deadline.