Working Journalists Are Lecturers in the New Master's Programme in Multimedia Journalism

Theory and practice will go along together in the new Master's programme in Multimedia Journalism of UNWE Media and Public Communications Department. For lecturers are invited well-unown journalists with authority in the professional community who have extensive practice and experience in some of the largest and most influential media in Bulgaria as well as specializations in established foreign media and agencies. Among them are Mirolyuba Benatova, Nikolay Stoyanov, Stefan Antonov, Gena Traykova, Rosen Bosev, Venelin Petkov, Asen Ivanov, Ivan Bakalov, Nikolay Doychinov as well as lecturers from the of UNWE Media and Public Communications Department.

The media has an important public role to inform and shape public opinion, to monitor and control other authorities, to mediate between the citizens and the state, to educate and entertain. The new digital and technological environment face the journalists to serious challenges in performing all these tasks. They have to adapt and build on classic skills of fact-checking, to work in a digital environment, to tell stories not only in text but also to know how to visualize them, to know not only the information needs of audiences but also how to protect the public interest, to be able to adapt to different media platforms - from the traditional newsroom, through modern online editorial and podcast formats to the new alliances of journalists in the NGO sector. Multilayered professional skills are a must for the journalism of the future. The Master's programme in Multimedia Journalism has an objective to acquire up-to-date knowledge and practical skills in the field of media, media market and to develop in-depth professional knowledge in the field of quality journalism. It builds up solidly the knowledge and skills provided by the lecturers in Bachelor`s programmes of the Department -  Media and Journalism and Media Economics.

Pragmatically, the objective is for students to build on their knowledge and skills in creating multimedia content for various media platforms, writing and shooting visual stories, interviewing techniques, quality journalistic work in a digital environment, using the entire Open Source Investigative Reporting Toolkit /OSINT/ available in a digital environment, use of modern journalistic formats such as fact-checking platforms, coverage of stories in conflict zones, news production and management of information flows, coverage of capital markets, banking and financial sectors, economic and financial crises, in-depth knowledge of the media market.

Among the main subjects studied by the students of Master's programme are Introduction to Multimedia Journalism, Media and Conflict, Business Journalism, Storytelling in Journalism, Reporting Journalism, Fact Checking and Database Work, Multimedia Journalism Skills, Data Analysis and Visualization, Multimedia Production, etc. The Media Practitioner class also plays an important role in the Master`s programme where again respected and proven practitioners in media and journalism will create a real media product. In it they will present to students their experience and will provide them opportunities for internships and work

Students will have the opportunity to work in the TV training studio of the Department which is equipped with new and modern technique. A director, a cameraman and an editor havind many years of television experience in rating shows will work with them there.