To be honest, I’m absolutely delighted that I’ve managed to find a way of keeping the Young Journalists’ School going this year. When I was defending the project in the Organizing Committee last year (Youth Year) I had my doubts about whether it would work and whether the journalists themselves would support it, and so on. It turns out that there’s a huge interest in the School’s seminars and that the topic of journalistic ethics is a serious concern not just for readers and viewers, but for the journalists themselves too, and that the seminars need to be run on a regular basis.

Last year the project was a joint effort with the Russian Youth Affairs Committee. This year I’ve managed to organize the School using funds from my charity. Youth Year is over, but the project goes on, and I hope the seminars will continue for as long as there’s a need for them.

This year the Young Journalists’ School involved Sergey Brilev, presenter of the “Vesti v subbotu” news programme, Aleksey Venediktov, editor-in-chief of the “Ekho Moskvy”radio station, Irina Petrovskaya, senior observer at the “Izvestiya” newspaper and “Ekho Moskvy”, Natalya Ivanova, literary critic and deputy editor-in-chief of the” Znamya” journal, and Darya Miloslavskaya, branch director at the International Centre of NGO Law in the Russian Federation.

Just like last year, the students spent Day 2 of the seminar at the REN TV television channel meeting the general director, the editor-in-chief and senior current affairs journalist Mikhail Osokin. Unfortunately, because of the tragic events in Katyn, Mariana Maksimovskaya wasn’t able to take part in the seminar.

The level of debate was quite professional and absolutely open. There was no separation of issues into politically correct and incorrect, and they talked about the things that are of concern to the students.

This openness helps both the experts and the journalists themselves to understand what makes youth journalism today tick and what issues they face. The dialogue with the kids was led not only by top-flight professionals, but by people who love their profession and devote themselves to it heart and soul. And this is very important. I think what we lack these days is not so much professional specialists, but people who love their profession, who care for it and its reputation.

These issues concern more than just Russian journalists. I got a letter from a girl in Kazakhstan who said she knew about our School and wanted to attend the seminar. She’s now here in Moscow. She told me how half the town came out to see her off (she’s from Karaganda) and how pleased her colleagues were for her. So it looks like the School’s growing in status )). By the way, this girl came up with the idea of inviting kids from the CIS countries to the Journalists’ School. I think it’s a great idea!


Aleksey Venediktov

Michail Osokin

Irina Petrovskaya

Students of Young Journalists School 2010