By Vestnik Kavkaza
This week, the Journalism Master School concluded its mission in Abkhazia. It was organized by the North-South Center for Political Analysis and the Aynar media center of Sukhumi. Initiators were aimed at improvement of the professional level of young Abkhazian journalists and development of professional communications between the Russian and Abkhazian media communities. The Journalism Master School was organized to expand the humanitarian dialogue of Russia and regional states. It has already visited Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan.
Students of the journalism department from Abkhazian State University and young journalists working in the local mass media listened to lectures by the director of the center “North-South” Alexei Vlasov “Informational picture of the South Caucasian region”; the editor-in-chief of the Television and Radio Broadcasting Organization of the Russian-Belarusian Union State Alexander Minakov; the Russian historian, the head of the International Council of the Association of Russian Society Researchers Gennady Bordyugov “An informational image of a country: power and public demands”; the vice-president of Public Relations Development Company Olga Peskova “The media vs PR: unity and struggle of opposites”; and Pr. of the international journalism department of Peoples' Friendship University of Russia Yuri Tavrovsky and the observer of Itogi Magazine Kirill Privalov.
Seminars by Olga Peskova and Kirill Privalov were the highest-rated ones.
“We need more such workshops because they extend our scope. For example, we knew a bit about PR, what is a difference between PR and journalism, propaganda. Now we know it exactly. Creation of an image is very interesting, as well as functioning of online reports. We found out how journalists work in other regions. My professional knowledge was at the level of 15% before, but now they are equal to 30-40%. People are positive, and it is pleasant that such professionals come to us and we have an opportunity to communicate with them,” a third-year student of the philological department of ASU Natalia Bodzhgua says.
“We have a lot of impressions from these three days; we learnt a lot. I hope there will be more journalism master schools because they bring a lot of interesting and useful for our profession,” a reporter Aslan Kutelia thinks.
“The event was organized at a high level. I remembered a lot, everything was cool and interesting. I liked the lecture by Alexei Vlasov because I am interested in political science. However, I liked other lectures as well,” a first-year student of ASU Afina Azhiba says.
“I think such schools should be conducted not only in Abkhazia, but also in Russia. We got good skills. It was interesting and pleasant to get acquainted with such people,” a student Khatuna Kvitsinia states.
The Caucasus Journalism School is planned to be organized in Sochi in November-December 2013.
