Arabic Journalist Trainer, Mentor, and Editor (Iraq based)

Duration: Dec 1st 2023- Feb 29th 2024

Location: Mosul, or northern Nineveh plains/ Erbil, Kurdistan, Iraq

Summary: The consultant will lead a 2.5-day workshop with journalists and artists to organize and design in-depth research, interviews, and on-the-ground documentation to collect stories that showcase conceptions of justice (and injustice) and transition within various communities in Iraq. Journalists participating in this programme will collaborate with artists to creatively interpret and visually represent stories, employing various mediums as illustrations, paintings, photography, and graphic design. This kick-off workshop addresses these themes through questions like:

1. How can interaction and cooperation with the media and art be set up in order to document and collect community narratives of (in)justice?
2. How can cooperation be developed with artists and journalists in order to support community participation in local and national dialogue?
3. How can we, through media and art and documentation, increase the involvement of citizens in public discourse?

The two- and half-day workshop will focus on organizing, researching, and connecting with communities for the coming months of production and output:

• Fostering teamwork
• Enhance collection and storytelling skills: ethical and thorough reporting of trauma, conflict-sensitive reporting, and professional treatment of victims and survivors by journalists and artists. (Do not harm principles).
• Power of images/visuals when working within highly sensitive contexts and message creation

The total output will be editing 16 journalistic and artistic outputs will be created by the end of this project. The Editor is expected to work closely with each group in the creative and journalistic process of output and production.

In addition to the workshop, the trainer is also supporting journalists in their editing:

1) Editor:

• Edit in Arabic all content and production for written and broadcasted content;
• Fact-check all stories and content; Ethical standards are applied
• Ensuring correct use of gender-sensitive terminology;
• Coordinate with artistic team on designs and content;
• Work with M&E about feedback in order to guide content creation;

2) Coordination:

o Set up clear work-flow with the journalists (including all documentation, working schedules, involvement, editing process, pitches, etc);

o Ensure research insights are integrated into stories to enhance assignment outcomes

o Support journalists in fieldwork

About you:

• Demonstrated experience mentoring journalists
• Demonstrated experience working as a journalist
• You are based in Iraq
• Experience in reviewing articles (fact-checking, edit copy)
• Speaks English & Arabic
• Experience in training and leading editorial meetings, especially around writing a feature story
• Can independently manage your own outputs
• Familiar with reporting on trauma-sensitive reporting