AJMI - Doha

Al jazeera Media Institute launched a “story writing workshop” for young people for nine Qatari students, presented by trainer Raghda Jamal as part of a project called Journalism Ethics Stories.

The project aims to train children to write and draw stories, that embocy messages and concepts of journalistic ethics, and to communicate them to a largest segment of children to help them understand ethics of journalism, and encourage them to become future journalists.

Trainer Raghda Jamal said: The workshop focused on two main issues, the first one is about basics of writing a story, while the other covered principles of journalism ethics in a simple manner that suits this age group, such as accuracy, objectivity, impartiality and integrity.

She added: "We worked for a week with each student individually to review the story from a language point of view and ensure availability of basic elements of the story, pointing out that the stories of students in this workshop carry diverse and beautiful ideas and at the same time reflect a principle of journalism ethics, and the titles of the stories are: The brilliant journalist, the difficult path, Amer's adventures, the brave journalist, the truth of the news, a debate at school, the mysterious truth, Reem's journey between success and regret, and a story of a mother.

For his part, Ibrahim Al-Janahi expressed his happiness with benefits he achieved from “Journalism Ethics Stories” initiative for Young People, which resulted in writing the story of  brilliant journalist which reflected the value of verifying source of the news and its validity and the importance of accuracy with regard to information, and expressed his pride in presenting the story to Sheikha Hind bint Hamad Al Thani, Vice Chairperson and CEO of Qatar Foundation, in the pavilion of the Al jazeera Media Institute at the location of the Akhlaquna Award, and also stressed the importance of the workshop he attended at Al jazeera Media Institute where he understood the importance of a plot when writing any story.

Khalifa al-Sada, author of Amer's Adventures, highlighted in his story the importance of mathematics in journalism, saying, "Arithmetic is an essential part of our lives, and in journalism, it helps us understand and analyze data accurately." "After attending “story writing course” for young people, I realized how these skills can be used to craft inspiring stories. Leveraging mathematics in journalism contributes to better presentation of information to the public.

It is worth noting that the Stories of Journalism Ethics Project for Young People was launched by the Institute due to its belief in the importance of supporting emerging segments of society and enhancing distinguished media skills of the younger generations, by organizing a series of interactive workshops and training programs with the aim to develop talents and skills of the younger generations.