Twenty-one students got an introduction to investigative journalism and its role in enhancing citizenship at a workshop in Lebanon’s northern port city of Tripoli.
The one-day training involved definitions of investigative journalism, duties and responsibilities of investigative journalists, and how to become reporters covering that beat.
Participants were also briefed on how to dig for information, ideas that could be developed into investigative reporting projects, computer-assisted research and reporting (a/k/a data-driven journalism), and skills to evaluate documents and figures.
A final session was dedicated to interviewing techniques and media ethics.
The workshop in November 2012 was conducted by Media Unlimited director Magda Abu-Fadil and organized by the Lebanese Center for Active Citizenship as part of the latter’s “Our Right to Know” campaign.
The students hailed mainly from the American University of Technology’s Tripoli and Halat campuses. A lawyer/student and a reporter from Beirut also joined the group.