Six budding community journalists have graduated from our first West Leeds Dispatch community reporters’ course.
Over six weeks at Bramley Lawn Day Centre, participants looked at basic photography, writing articles, headlines, ethics, law, video and podcasting, among other things.
Keely Bannister from Bramley, Madeleine Byrne from Farsley, Mike Clifton from Pudsey, Mat Dale from Armley, Siona Law from Bramley and Pudsey’s Damon Sugden all successfully completed the course.
They received community reporter press cards, a certificate and badge – and the knowledge and confidence to continue to contribute for WLD now the course has finished. We hope they’ll provide a voice for their communities and shine a light on what’s going on.
Editor John Baron, who ran the course, said:
“It’s been a great six weeks and I hope our new community reporters have learnt a lot and had some fun along the way. Some of them are already looking at putting together a regular podcast, so watch this space!”
The second course is due to start in a fortnight at Beech Hall Care Home in Armley, with all nine free places snapped up within 24 hours.
WLD is looking to run a further four courses, so watch this space, and keep your eye out on the site for contributions from participants. You can find some of their work here.
A big thanks goes to Fran Graham and Bramley Lawn for hosting the course for the past six weeks.
Help us to run more courses and continue our work
Producing your daily dose of West Leeds Dispatch comes at a cost!
There’s the hosting of the website you’re reading now, running our popular e-mail newsletter, membership of independent press regulator Impress, attending summer events, paying for equipment etc etc.
We need at least £200 a month just to break even – that’s money currently coming out of the pockets of dedicated volunteers who are passionate about what’s happening in our communities, connecting you with local groups and organisations as well as holding decision-makers to account and championing local issues.
And all that’s BEFORE we even think about paying something for people’s time – for instance, our editor puts in more than 24 hours a week in his ‘spare’ time to ensure The Dispatch publishes daily.
To put it bluntly, after nearly four years of daily publishing, we are not sustainable!
And we need YOUR help to continue …
For the cost of less than a couple of cups of coffee you can help support local community news and continue to give our communities a voice by taking out a subscription for just £4 per month (that’s just a pound a week).
As a thanks you’ll get your name on a roll of honour on our website. More importantly you will be enabling us to keep bringing you the news that matters about your neighbourhood.
Achieving a bedrock of supporters will give us a firm financial footing and help us plan for the future.
Supporting us couldn’t be easier…
Just follow this link.
or set up a standing order with your bank:
Contact us on Paywestleedsdispatch@gmail.com if you’d like to do this.
Over to you …
