A new partnership between the Professional Journalists’ Association and the Institute for Advancement of Journalism will offer more affordable training to local working journalists. Paid up ProJourn members will get a 40% discount on the cost of courses offered by the IAJ from 1 November onwards.
There is a need for local media professionals to be able to access training in order to keep their skills up-to-date, particularly in a fast-changing sector, says Projourn general secretary, Samantha Perry. She says many newsrooms aren’t giving added training to journalists. “ProJourn is thus stepping in to help its membership improve their skills and to remain relevant in newsrooms that are rapidly transitioning to more digital environments,” Perry says.
The organisations believe they are perfectly aligned in terms of their mandates. The IAJ wants to improve journalistic ethics and standards through training and Projourn is concerned with the upskilling of journalists, particularly from disadvantaged backgrounds.
“We are happy to support Projourn in providing much-needed skills to their members with our leading-edge training programmes and top internationally-trained facilitators,” says Michael Schmidt, director of the IAJ.
