Windhoek
All 21 New Era journalists are to undergo training at the University of Namibia (Unam), to equip them with the latest trends in the global media industry.
The training, which will be offered for a full week to three groups of journalists, will also offer refresher tips to reporters.
Facilitated by the Namibia Business School, the training will last for three weeks in total. New Era Publication Corporation Managing Editor Toivo Ndjebela – himself a product of the Unam journalism school – said the need for training was necessitated by global developments in the media industry and that his team of journalists needed to keep up with such trends.
“You’d realise, for example, that the media has strongly gone digital and hardcopy sales of newspapers have declined sharply in most western countries and parts of Africa. This training is meant to prepare our journalists for some of these changes and other aspects of modern journalism,” Ndjebela said.
Dr Fred Mwilima, one of the facilitators of the training, sees the training as an ideal opportunity for New Era journalists to be empowered with new skills.
“Today we live in an environment where the readers don’t have time and you need to hook them in your story … Some of the journalists are already trained and working, but here we will refresh them with the skills they need. Some of them are already in a working environment and doing these things everyday, so it becomes natural,” the veteran Unam media lecturer said.