Training of Trainers (ToT) and Summer New Media Institute
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Training of Trainers (ToT) and Envisioning a Summer Training Program for Youth Media Workshops

Voices Beyond Walls established a Training of Trainers (ToT) program in the spring of 2008 with young adults (university students and volunteers aged 18-25) from refugee camps including Jenin, Balata, Al-Farrah, Jalazon, Al-Amari, and Qalandiya. These trainers assisted as facilitators of digital storytelling workshops conducted in summer 2008. The Training of Trainers (ToT) program in 2008 was supported by a grant from the World Bank. This training program will be expanded to include more participants and a professional training staff, along with comprehensive curricula in new media production and pedagogy.

World Bank Youth Innovation Fund for the Middle East and North Africa: Youth Empowerment Through Digital Media Training

We seek to establish a Summer New Media Institute in Palestine in partnership with several collaborating organizations, and envision the first program to be conducted in June-July 2010.

The residential institute would offer an intensive new media training program to qualified young Palestinians (over 18) to develop specialized skills in media aesthetics/storytelling, digital media production, dissemination, and youth education.  The 20-25 participants selected for the program would complete a digital video short during the summer training program, and serve as facilitators for 6-7 three-week youth media workshops planned in selected refugee camps and a pilot public school (in the West Bank and Gaza) following the program. Some participants with sufficient expertise may be offered internships with local broadcast/media companies or with film/video productions.

In preparation for the summer institute, the collaborating organizations will seek to develop a well-defined training curriculum, technical resources, juried selection process, and engage with domain experts and practitioners to help develop and co-teach the program in 2010.