DepEd Trains Campus Journalism Mentors

Tacloban City (PNA) – At least 400 high school campus paper advisers in Eastern Visayas attended the first batch of the four-day regional training of division mentors on campus journalism on Wednesday at the Leyte National High School gymnasium.

Education officials said participants of the training-workshop will serve as “pool of division mentors who shall conduct the same activity at the division and school levels.”

DepEd Regional Director Luisa Bautista-Yu, in a memorandum, said the event aims to “orient the school paper advisers on the current trends and new developments in campus journalism and in digital media.”

Other activities include enhancement of journalist skills of the advisers and update effective school paper management and editorial technique.

The conference will also serve as proper forum for the school paper advisers to discuss and address issues concerning journalism competitions from division, region and national.

Topics covered during the training are news writing, copy reading and headline writing, feature writing, science and technology writing, editorial writing, sports writing, photojournalism, editorial cartooning, on-line collaborative publishing, and script and radio broadcasting.

The second batch of training for elementary is set on August 6 to 9 to be attended by another 565 school paper advisers in the region.

According to Cesar Montaño, president of the Regional Secondary School Paper Advisers Association (RSSPAA), the training will also prepare the region for the upcoming National Schools Press Conference in Koronadal City in South Cotabato.

Regional journalism coordinator Gertrudes Mabutin is hoping that the training will lead to the pool of division trainers into “one team working for a common goal for campus journalism in the region.”

“After typhoon Yolanda in 2013, we were dropped from the rank of hall of famers in the national level…But if all of you will transfer satisfactorily the training here to your respective division and school, then for the first time we will be very competitive, strong, and quality schools papers in the division, regional, and national hall of fame,” curriculum and learning management division chief Alejandrito L. Yman told the participants.

In the last NSPC training in Taguig City, the region bagged 21 major awards in various journalistic competitions. (PNA) CTB/SQM/ROR