Say Yes, Autumn 2007: Faculties to foster a child–friendly media

A media training session in Uşak.
Photograph by Şehnaz Tanılkan © UNICEF Turkey 2006

Following the success of media training sessions for active journalists, the concepts of child rights and a child–friendly media are starting to make their way into the curricula of Turkey’s communications faculties.

Efforts to train Turkish journalists to be sensitive towards children and children’s issues take on a new dimension this Autumn as communications faculty students help children to create their own media products. The hands–on exercise forms part of the training that will be given to the future media professionals at two leading universities: the state–run Anadolu University in Eskişehir, which is well known for its broadcasting facilities, and İstanbul’s prestigious private Galatasaray University.

Postgraduate students at the universities are being offered a series of modules entitled communication for a child–centred media. The concept was thrashed out over the summer months at meetings attended by rectors and staff members from the communications faculties of several universities. The meetings were sponsored by UNICEF and also attended by representatives of the broadcasting watchdog RTÜK. There will be both theoretical and practical lessons, but the experience of working together with children to create news articles, radio programmes and video footage promises to prove the most memorable part of the curriculum.

After further development in the light of experience, the modules are expected to become part of the education provided in many if not all of Turkey’s communications faculties. There are more than 30 such faculties, and media organisations are increasingly drawing their employees from their graduates. While some faculties already timetable lessons in ethics or human rights, none currently offer specific guidance on how to work with children.

Sessions for journalists

The new initiative builds on the training sessions which have been provided to hundreds of active broadcast and print journalists since 2005 as a result of cooperation between UNICEF and the Independent Communication Network (BIANET), founded by Turkish writers and journalists. Training has been provided to representatives of national and local television channels, radio stations and newspapers in seven regions and two individual provinces.

The training sessions encourage and teach reporters to write about children and child rights issues, to obtain information from children and to seek out and report their opinions on current topics. Participants also learn to respect the private lives of the children they encounter in their work, to protect the identities of children who are victims of abuse or suspects in crimes, and to avoid the use of emotive language and images which stereotype children either as mere helpless sufferers or as a monstrous threat to society.

Positive findings

Media training sessions have led to an increase in the number of newspaper stories about children and an improvement in the respect shown by journalists for children’s rights. According to the report of a project study group chaired by Associate Professor Dr. Gülgün Erdoğan Tosun of the Communications Faculty of the Aegean University in İzmir, journalists taking part in the sessions have been using a wider range of sources when handling news about children. Sessions have also led to heightened local media coverage of cases of violence against children, education and health problems and child labour issues, as well as UNICEF–backed activities and campaigns.

In spite of these positive findings, both the participants and the trainers — drawn from among Turkey’s leading media educators — stress that the media training sessions need to be extended and repeated if they are to have a lasting impact. Moreover, the two–day events can only touch on some of the most practical aspects of the relationship between children and the media in the field of news gathering and reporting. Other forums are needed to examine and develop issues such as children’s access to the media, child participation, programmes and publications for children, media literacy among children and ethical advertising.

From in–service to pre–service

The in–service training sessions provided by UNICEF and BIANET are to continue around the country in the rest of 2007 and in the years to come. They are bringing a child–friendly media one step closer. The development of child–focused pre–service training in communications faculties will be a second step in the right direction.

Çilem Kaya.
Photograph courtesy of Çilem Kaya © 2006

Useful for us; good for children

Çilem Kaya, a journalist now working with the popular national daily Hürriyet, took part in a media training session organised by UNICEF and BIANET in Ankara in early 2006. Even before that I used to pay attention to children and look out for news about them, she says. But at the workshops we found out in more detail about their rights, their interests, the issues that attracted their attention …

Kaya and other media professionals from Ankara and surrounding provinces were encouraged to regard children as individuals with experiences and opinions of their own. They were urged to seek out stories about children and children’s rights, to approach children with sensitivity, to speak to them in clear comprehensible language and to permit them to report their opinions in their own words.

In line with the pledge which she made back in 2006, Kaya has put these principles into practice. I have frequently tried to write news about children and about the work which NGOs are doing for children, she explains, and I have made an effort to ensure that these articles are actually published. Nevertheless, she admits that journalists and broadcasters in general do not pay enough attention to children.

At the moment, we in the media are unable to give children sufficient opportunity to express themselves. In time, more news will appear. But we need to be reminded as often as possible about how to approach children. After all, none of us is a trained child psychologist or educationalist …

The workshops were enjoyable. What I learned about child rights has been beneficial. It was also a useful event in terms of bringing journalists together. I had the opportunity to meet and chat to many journalists from the surrounding provinces.

The Hürriyet reporter recommends that UNICEF and other organisations working with children should continue and extend their work with the press, especially the national press, which tends to under–report children’s issues due to its rapidly–moving political and economic agenda. It would be useful for us and it would be good for children, she asserts. Personally she says she would be more than happy to take part in further briefings, seminars or workshops — or to work directly with children to help them create their own media outlets.

Kaya is delighted to hear that students in communications faculties are to study communication for a child–focused media. They will be able to learn from the start what we only discovered later on, she remarks.

Previous page |

Skip to the page footer menu or select an item from this list ▼

SAY YES, AUTUMN 2007

Download this issue in pdf format. [PDF 808KB]

* How to use RSS …