The new training centre will enable journalists from Poland and other countries in its region to develop their skills and expertise during classes taught by experts, Polish Radio executives said after signing the agreement with Noel Curran, director-general of the European Broadcasting Union.
Curran said after the signing that the team-up aimed to enable public service media to further develop.
He added that this was in line with a new EBU strategy of providing customised services for its members using the organisation’s knowledge and experience.
On account of its location, Warsaw is a great place to host such a centre, he also said, as quoted by Polish Radio’s IAR news agency.
Curran said, as cited by IAR, that Polish Radio was an active member of the EBU.
In addition to Polish Radio journalists, public media employees from other Visegrad Group countries, the Baltic states and selected Eastern Partnership countries will be able to undergo training in the new centre in Warsaw.
Polish Radio CEO Andrzej Rogoyski said: “We are pleased that thanks to this undertaking our journalists will be able to acquire new skills."
He added: “We will also be happy to host colleagues from other European countries. We believe that, thanks to our cooperation with the EBU, we will be able to learn a lot, but also pass on experience and expertise to our partners.”
Under the agreement, two training programmes a year will be held at Polish Radio, the IAR news agency reported.
For starters, training will be offered in mobile journalism and in the use of social media in journalistic work, according to Mariusz Staniszewski, member of the board at Polish Radio.
“Modern media organisations face the necessity of creating various forms of content and using different ways of distributing it, and online content has become an absolute priority nowadays,” Staniszewski said.
One of the lecturers in the new training centre will be Mark Egan, a journalist, producer and trainer with 12 years of experience at the BBC, the IAR news agency reported. He has worked as a trainer for the EBU, the BBC, the Guardian and United Nations agencies, according to the news agency.
Staniszewski said: “Polish Radio today is not just a radio broadcaster in the classical sense, but a modern multimedia platform. We broadcast three radio channels exclusively online, and we have a dynamically growing news portal, polskieradio24.pl. To develop further, we need best-practice standards from the best partners.”
The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) is the world’s leading alliance of public service media. It has 117 member organisations in 56 countries and an additional 34 associates in Asia, Africa, Australasia and the Americas.
EBU members operate more than 2,000 television, radio and online channels and services, and offer content across other platforms. Together they reach an audience of more than 1 billion people around the world, broadcasting in more than 160 languages.
(gs/pk)
Source: IAR, ebu.ch