Tribune man, Ifedayo Ogunyemi bags global fellowship

A senior reporter with the Nigerian Tribune, Ifedayo Ogunyemi, has been selected among the 16 participants of the 2022 LEDE Fellowship, a global programme organised by the Solutions Journalism Network (SJN).

According to a public statement by the community manager, SJN, Julia Hotz, the journalists selected for the global fellowship will spread solutions journalism around the world with their entrepreneurship projects over the course in the next 12 months.

Hotz added that the LEDE fellows will “Leverage networks of journalism professionals; engage communities; disseminate solutions stories; and elevate the people and narratives that problem-focused reporting is missing.”

She noted that the selection of the fellows, including three Africa-based journalists, was informed by the quality, depth and potential impact of their projects.

The annual fellowship which is in its third year received over 250 applications globally for the 2022 edition.

The selected fellows include Mikhaela Dimpas (Manila, Philippines), Ryan Conarro (Denver, US), Praveeni Senanayake (Kandy, Sri Lanka), Swati Sanyal Tarafdar (Vijayawada, India), Amanda Anderson (Granite Falls, Minnesota, US), Badru Dean Mulumba (Juba, South Sudan), Catherine Edwards (Vienna, Austria), Ma. Victoria (Mavic) Conde (Manila, Philippines).

Others are Dora Santos Silva (Lisbon, Portugal), Allison Lichter Joseph (New York, US), Verashni Pillay (Johannesburg, South Africa), Irene Caselli (Athens, Greece), Caitlin Schmidt (Tucson, Arizona, US), Carla Rosch (London, UK) and Nieves Zúñiga (Pamplona, Spain).

“From Juba, South Sudan, to Tucson, Arizona, the LEDE Fellows will be experimenting with everything from newsletters to YouTube channels to innovative community engagement. Wide-ranging in beat, medium, geography and scope, their projects will focus on one or more of these core questions, with the aim of providing insights that can be shared across the Solutions Journalism Network,” Hotz said.

She also stated that their projects are categorised under three cohorts based on how to broadcast solutions journalism to new audiences, spread solutions journalism regionally, and build solutions journalism subscribers and ambassadors.

Ogunyemi’s LEDE project on Campus Solutions, will mobilise and train student journalists in the art of constructive journalism and how to report solutions stories about the country’s education system and sector. The second leg of the project will also train journalism educators in tertiary institutions in Oyo State.

Ogunyemi noted that the rationale behind the Campus Solutions project is to change the narrative about the nation educational sector, adding that the reports about the sector have been hitherto problem-focused.

“The project will mobilise, train and support campus journalists from the selected Nigerian campuses to report about the social responses to the challenges facing their immediate environments.

“We’ll also look at how best to incorporate solutions journalism into the curriculum; course and project works, among others of students studying journalism in Oyo State by training their educators. This will help in ensuring that tertiary institutions churn out all-round journalists who will assist the society,” he said.

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