| Reporting
diversity project in Latvia and Romania
| Region: | Latvia
and Romania |
Micro- < $15,000
|
Small-$15,000-$100,000 |
Medium-$100,000-$500,000 |
Large-$500,000-$1 million |
Very large- >$1 million |
| Partners: | The
International Federation of Journalists |
| Funders: | The
Freedom Forum |
Project objectives:
|
The project aimed to
help media in both Latvia and Romania diminish tensions within their ethnically
divided countries by strengthening the capabilities of these news organizations
to distribute more in-depth, balanced, and pluralistic reports. Specific objectives
were: | | • |
to enable media to promote greater popular understanding of human rights, minority
rights, international obligations, and the requirements of democratic citizenship; |
| • | to
support greater understanding among all ethnic groups of the social, political,
and economic concerns within each community. | | Through
cross-ethnic initiatives, MDI aimed to build constructive and influential relationships
between journalists and news organizations. |
Project activities:
| • | Production
of a 'Reporting Diversity Resource Manual' in both Latvian and Romanian languages.
(The interest of the news media and media-education organizations in the reporting
diversity manual was so overwhelming that the print run was exhausted just two
months after the manual was published); | | • |
two "train the trainer" workshops to develop specialised teaching modules
for using the reporting diversity manuals; | | • | based
on this work, Florin Pesnicu, director of the Center for Independent Journalism
(Bucharest) launched a series of seminars and round-table discussions on diversity-related
issues. | | • |
in Latvia, Inta Brikse, head of the Journalism Department at Riga University,
created and introduced a 'Reporting Diversity Curriculum'. [NOTE: this went on
to be used as a model for other journalism schools in the region, and inspired
a later MDI focus on reporting diversity curriculum development for university
journalism professors]. | |
