This weekend, I attended the Centre of Investigative Journalism's Summer School at City University London. The three day course focussed on high risk investigations such as taking on greedy corporations, secretive governments, cheats, criminals and predatory celebrities. I learnt a lot at the CIJ Summer School which I believe will benefit me in my future journalistic career.
Workshops I attended:
- I took part in a workshop led by successful journalists Melanie McFadyean, Robert Miller and Martin Tomkinson, which taught me the tricks and tips needed to conduct serious interviews for print and broadcast. They also demonstrated to the class what necessary skills are needed to avoid pitfalls when interviewing.
- I also attended classes about company accounts. In these sessions, I learnt how to access company documents and what to look for in them when writing a news story. I found this extremely helpful and will definitely come in useful.
- Professor Mark Lee Hunter led a workshop about story-based inquiry where he explained how to frame, sell, write and promote a story. I learnt how to use hypotheses in the method of investigation and how to write up the best story possible.
- To add to this, Court Reporter, Paul Cheston, taught me how to do court reporting and get the best stories. This class was a practical guide on everything you need to know when doing court reporting. I now can't wait to put this new knowledge into action!
- Famous journalist, Andrew Jennings, led a workshop called 'How to Write Stories Readers Will Remember'. I found this workshop very beneficial and believe I have gained crucial knowledge to help me improve my writing.
Keynote speeches I attended:
- As well as workshops, there were a number of key speeches from guest speakers which I found extremely inspiring. There was a panel discussion, speaking of the case of Jimmy Savile. This gave me an insight into how stories are broken and how they are brought to the public domain.
- US Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, offered tips on how to make news stories more important. He shared his own personal experiences of how he dug deeper for a news story.
- Ioan Grillo talked about investigating Mexican Drug Cartels. He discussed reporting on dangerous subjects and the personal risk involved, which I found very fascinating.
Overall, I am pleased that I spent time and money on attending the CIJ Summer School. I learnt many more skills and gained crucial knowledge from the industry's top professionals. I am looking forward to putting my new found expertise into action.
Abbey Hartley
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