An extensive camp focusing on imparting essential basics of journalism operations has been re-launched by the digital media news agency Times of Pakistan to educate and familiarize interested individuals in the field of journalism and provide them with opportunities in multiple news outlets.
ISLAMABAD: Beginning on Monday, the four-week educational camp established by the Times of Pakistan media team will begin. The purpose of the camp is to reiterate the basic knowledge gaps found in many news agencies and the absence of educational channels to impart this knowledge to the citizens of the nation and to remove these obstacles so that the people can better operate and understand the outlines of media investigation, reporting and fact-checking strategies.
The educational and informative camp set up by Times of Pakistan (Private) Limited will take on the individuals who have already signed up for the experience and lessons before the camp initiates its function. The enrolled individuals will preferably be those who have no professional exposure to media operations in the past and will begin their journey in the field of journalism in great detail and under the supervision of expert media personnel currently employed by and part of the agency’s news reporting team. These professionals will be present at the camp to guide the learners for four weeks according to the agency’s remarks on the entire campaign at Jhelum headquarters where the agency has had its biggest operational centre for the past two decades.
The complete details of this camp have not been released to the general public. However, the four-week program workshop will focus on many aspects of the journalistic activities that seasoned professionals in the field have acquired over the years and have built successful careers around those principles because the camp will educate many people who have no professional degrees in journalism.
The first week of the camp will be focused on presenting the differences and similarities between the concepts of media and journalism. The field experts from the Times of Pakistan will highlight the history of both concepts and how media evolved through the eras of journalism from paper to digital form in the 21st century. The learners will be thoroughly familiarized with the concepts of ethics to ensure that the core values of reporting truth are not compromised at any instance. Along with this, the camp will enlighten the upcoming journalists about the purposes of journalism and how power is associated with maintaining discipline at every level of society.
The following weeks will be dedicated to the working models of journalism and social media and the problems faced by field experts in digital reporting and investigative journalism. This portion will be dedicated to the art of practice which is an essential part of the field of journalism and explains the obligations of media to the interested audience.
Editor-in-Chief of the Times of Pakistan, Hassan Mustafa will attend the camp once every week and share key points regarding ethics in media and how modern tools are required to construct an effective news report after considerable investigation and analysis of each incident. The purpose of the camp is to equip responsible citizens of the nation with media literacy and allow them to take part in discovering the truth behind the incidents and stories that take place in the country. The additional aim of the entire camp is to provide the trained individuals a chance to build careers in journalism. For this purpose, Times of Pakistan has announced that the news agency will hire many young and upcoming journalists from this successful campaign.
Moreover, the agency will keenly try to sign contracts with other friendly media outlets so that the remaining attendants can begin their careers at the end of this extensive media literacy camp from which the upcoming professionals will have gained essential knowledge about digital and traditional media reporting in modern times.
