As a part of our development of partnerships and focus of delivering collaborative training with partners, we are pleased to work with our partners on the production of a new set of MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses). The three MOOCs which will be produced by Sowt, the Yemeni Archive and the Digital Rights Foundation, will be providing extensive resources on podcast journalism, open-source investigations and digital security.
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Sowt is an Amman-based podcasting platform which produces and distributes high-quality audio programs in Arabic, to create an environment in which dialogue on and discussion of essential and sensitive topics to the Arab listener around the world is the norm.
We are partnering with Sowt through Check Global funding to develop a MOOC on podcasting and make this available under a CC license. Sowt will produce an open-source course introducing podcasting and providing a step-by-step guide into researching, producing, publishing, and disseminating podcasts – the course will be hosted on the NAWA Media website, walking students through the necessary steps to make their own podcast. The lesson plan is divided into four chapters, each dedicated to introducing students to different aspects of podcast-making.
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The Yemeni Archive is an initiative created by a collective of human rights activists, technologists, and journalists working to securely preserve and verify open source documentation relating to human rights violations and other crimes committed by all sides during the conflict in Yemen. Since 2018, Yemeni Archive has trained more than 100 Yemeni journalists on open source investigation techniques, photography for journalism and digital security.
Check Global is partnering with the Yemeni Archive to present an exhaustive MOOC on campaigning and advocacy. Research and investigations being produced often have strong human interest angles as well as implications for human rights, making the integration of such a training necessary. The lesson plan will be divided into different chapters comprising: an introduction to campaigning and the theory of change; how to integrate advocacy to investigative work; the tools at each journalist’s disposal; and storytelling techniques to build mobilization.
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Digital Rights Foundation is a Pakistan-based NGO that focuses on research-based advocacy on ICTs to support human rights, democratic processes, and digital governance. Digital Rights Foundation aims to strengthen protections for human rights defenders (HRDs), with a focus on women’s rights, in digital spaces through policy advocacy & digital security awareness-raising.
Check Global is partnering with DRF to produce an exhaustive MOOC on digital safety for journalists. With more and more people turning to online spaces to access information and news, journalists are being exposed to a new set of vulnerabilities in the form of hacking, phishing attacks, online harassment and digital monitoring. The plan for the MOOC plan will be divided into a variety of chapters comprising an introduction to digital threats faced by media workers and journalists, with a focus on the region; communications security; browsing and data security; and account security and digital wellbeing.