New training from Google and CIJ

Behind Local News
Sep 2, 2018 · 2 min read

In the latest column on Google tools and training for journalists, Matt Cooke, Head of Partnerships & Training with Google News Lab, talks about a new series of free workshops for developing digital news-gathering and research skills.

Matt Cooke (pic via @newsrewired)

Investigative journalists depend on a number of digital techniques in their work — from analyzing data on a shared spreadsheet, to identifying the original source of a photograph or picking through the minutes of a public meeting on a local website.
That’s why we’re working with the Centre for Investigative Journalism (CIJ) to provide a new program, called “Access to Tools.”

Over the coming months a team of expert trainers will provide up to 20 free workshops across the U.K., each designed to help newsroom and freelance journalists sharpen their digital newsgathering and research skills.
The practical workshops will feature technology from a range of providers and include real-life examples, including how individual journalists have traced original sources.

The director of the CIJ, James Harkin, said: “Our leading concern is to put the best tools in the hands of investigative journalists, and then grow their expertise in using them.
‘Building on our 15 years of expertise in data journalism, advanced internet research, financial search, and internet-powered fact-checking and our relationships of trust with the corporate and independent local media, ‘Access to Tools’ is the perfect way to extend the already impressive reach of our regional network and to get out there into more regional newsrooms, communities, and universities.”

In addition to our work with CIJ, we’ll continue to provide a free range of training workshops directly to newsrooms and journalism schools. Since the launch of the News Lab in 2015, we’ve trained nearly 7 thousand journalists in the U.K. alone — but there’s more to do.

You can learn more about the free UK workshops on the CIJ website. For those further afield, our Google News Initiative Training Center has a specific course on Investigative Reporting.

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Behind Local News UK

The stories behind the stories, from the regional press in the UK

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