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Between the 24th and 26th of January, the students and graduates of Chisinau School of Advanced Journalism (CSAJ) participated in a Data Journalism Camp where they learned techniques of investigative journalism from Paul Radu, who is the executive director of Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and director of the RISE Project Romania. The youngsters were also trained by Dumitru Lazur, a local media expert, scoaladejurnalism.md wrote.
Participants in the training heard the stories of the journalist Paul Radu, who has had a professional experience of over 15 years. He spoke about the investigation of crimes, about organized crime, about money laundering amounting at millions of dollars, and about the involvement of corrupt politicians into the schemes of some criminal groups.
In his turn, Dumitru Lazur showed students how to use open official data. Then, trainers guided and assisted students during practical exercises in finding topics for investigation on the basis of open governmental data. At the end of the training, many of the participants expressed their desire to do investigative journalism and to continue the investigations identified during the camp.
Paul Radu was pleased with students’ performances during the training and with the interest they showed in the topics discussed. “I didn’t expect them to be so curious, as they are still students at the School. I am pleasantly surprised by the involvement and seriousness they proved when identifying topics for investigation and by how they managed to collect certain data and information about possible frauds involving public officials,” the Romanian journalist said.
The training was organized by the Independent Journalism Center (IJC) with financial support from Free Press Unlimited (the Netherlands) and National Endowment for Democracy (the USA).
