Dubai Press Club has announced a collaboration with Twitter to launch a year-long training programme for journalists, media students and graduates. The first of its kind in the region, the programme, announced on Tuesday at the 16th Arab Media Forum, is set to start in September, and will be offered across the United Arab Emirates, with plans to expand it to university students across the GCC region a year later.

 The pioneering initiative aims to support student learning and growth in digital journalism. Starting mid-September, the stand-alone programme will include training sessions in both English and Arabic on how journalists can use the various tools available on Twitter for news discovery, reporting and storytelling, to enable them to leverage the platform and report current  events in the digital age. The training sessions will take place at the Dubai Press Club and is open to media and journalism students and graduates.

 The announcement was made at a press conference held on the second day of the 16th Arab Media Forum. Alia Al Theeb, Director of Dubai Press Club (DPC), said: “The initiative developed in partnership with Twitter forms part of our ongoing efforts to empower journalists in the region. The programme will build students’ skills and competencies so that they can develop into tomorrow’s leading journalists.”

“Twitter has quickly gained widespread following among the young generation as a news source, and is at the forefront of the trend for people gaining control of news consumption through social media,” Al Theeb said. She further explained that social media tools like Twitter are changing the way news content is produced, distributed and consumed. The training programme seeks to enable young media professionals to stay abreast of the latest news trends and the role of social media platforms in redefining and transforming news coverage.

Al Theeb also said Dubai Press Club is excited to bring this unique training programme in collaboration with one of the world’s most well-known social media players. She expressed confidence that the programme will increase the knowledge and competency of media students and achieve other key desired training outcomes.