Are you an Ivorian or Ghanaian media?
Does your media seek to offer more gender-sensitive content and implement structural changes?
The Equal Voices project offers a series of training sessions on editorial practices supporting gender equality for journalists, as well as a peer-to-peer programme for media managers that will help them implement good organisational practices.
Background/Introduction
The Canal France International (CFI) in partnership with Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) is implementing a project titled“Equal voices”to support gender equality in the media and also promote, through media, a better representation of women, as experts and agents of change.
Equal Voices’ main objective is combatting gender inequalities and stereotypes and promoting women at all levels of responsibility in Ivorian and Ghanaian societies through gender aware and sensitive media. More specifically, the project aims to strengthen the capacities of male and female media professionals to promote, through their managerial and editorial policies and practices, a better and more balanced gender representation.This objective of the project is aligned with the framework of the SDG (United Nations Sustainable Development Goals), specifically Goal 5 aiming to “Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls”.For more information, please find the project description on CFI’s website: https://cfi.fr/en/project/equal-voices
Key Beneficiaries
8 media organisations (4 in Ghana and 4 in Côte d’Ivoire):
- 8 media managers from the 8 selected media organisations (one manager per media: an editorial manager or a person exercising management or HR functions) participating in the peer-to-peer programme
- 16 journalists from the 8 selected media organisations (two journalists per media) participating in trainings
Key activities
- Peer-to-peer programme for selected media managers: This will involve peer-to-peer sessions and regional exchange sessions for the media managers selected from the eight (8) media organisations (4 in Ghana and 4 in Côte d’Ivoire). The sessions will provide the platform for media managers to identify challenges and opportunities in terms of gender equality in their media organisations, set goals and put in place the tools and actions to achieve these goals. The sessions will also focus on developing tools and actions for implementing agreed goals and objectives that relate to their internally discussed and agreed orientations. The peer-to-peer and regional exchange approach hinges on learning through the sharing of experiences and good practices. Selected media managers will participate in three separate workshops, launch and closing conference for the project as follows:
- Project Launch: Sepetmber 2023 in Accra, Ghana
- Peer-to-peer I: Sepetmber 2023 in Accra, Ghana (1 days)
- Peer-to-peer II: Beginning of 2024 in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire (2 days)
- Peer-to-peer III: Beginning of 2025 in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire (1 day)
- Project Closing conference: 2025
- Coaching and Mentorship for Media Managers: During the programme, and between workshops, the media managers will count on the support of the mentors through four sessions of online coaching per media organisation. Those mentors will use their experience and knowledge to guide the managers towards the accomplishment of their goals.
- Capacity building for selected journalists: 16 journalists selected from the 8 media organisations (2 per media organisation) will participate in gender equality related trainings. The journalists will be divided by country.
a) Women’s empowerment training: building and improving the capacity of the 16 selected journalists on the concepts, theories and underpinnings of gender, women’s rights and women’s empowerment; the indicators; challenges and critical trends – international and national as well as the media’s role in promoting women’s empowerment. Selected journalists will participate in workshops as follows:
- 4-day training of 8 Journalists in Ghana
- 4-day of 8 Journalists in Cote d’Ivoire
- 2-day follow-up training Ghana
- 2-day follow-up training in Cote d’Ivoire
b) Gender sensitiveJournalism training: building and improving the capacity of selected journalists on the concepts, theories and underpinnings of gender and women’s rights; the notion of Gender and empowerment; representation of women in media and gender stereotypes; the critical trends and issues; the importance of gender sensitive reporting and the practice of producing media content in a way which is sensitive to gender inequalities and portrays women and men fairly. Selected journalists will participate in workshops as follows:
- 5-day Training of 8 Journalists in Ghana
- 5-day Training of 8 Journalists in Cote d’Ivoire
- 3-day follow up training of Journalists in Ghana
- 3-day follow up training of Journalists in Cote d’Ivoire
c) Coaching for story development: The selected journalists will also participate in one-one coaching session for story development (2 days per journalist)
Conditions of Application
This call for application aims at selecting a total of eight (8) media organisations (4 in Ghana and 4 in Côte d’Ivoire).
To be eligible, each nomination must consist of one media manager and two journalists.
Below are the criteria for application
1. Pre-requisites
- Must be either a Radio, television, print or online media organisation
- Located either in Ghana or Cote d’Ivoire
- Have a politically independent editorial line
- Have an editorial staff made up of at least 5 journalists
- Media organisation must have been in existence for at least 3 years
- The media organisation must be willing and committed to appoint two journalists (at least one female) to participate in the training workshops for the duration of the project
- The media manager must be willing to commit to actively participate in the peer-to-peer workshops. His or her presence at each of the three workshops, at the project launch seminar and closing conference and his or her active involvement in the implementation of an internal project is essential.
2. Conditions
The durations and timelines are indicative. Potential days of travel to the session site should also be considered.
The participation of the media organisations in the programme requires the full availability of the participating journalists and managers for the duration of the training. The managers of the beneficiary journalists must undertake to release them from all professional obligations during the days of activity.
From a logistical point of view, the project will cover travel, accommodation and catering costs when necessary for meetings, seminars and workshops. For participants coming from other municipalities than Abidjan and Accra, transport costs will also be covered by the project.
As a follow-up to the training, the beneficiary journalists will participate in online coaching (mentoring) provided by the trainers. It is expected that the selected journalists are committed to making themselves available for the coaching sessions.
Details of the dates of the activities will be communicated to the selected media.
3. Application procedure:
Interested media organisations should click on the link below to submit an online application. The application must include the Curriculum vitae of the media manager and the two journalists.
4. Key dates (as an indication):
- Deadline for the submission of the application: 25thJune 2023
- Publication of the preselection: Week of the 26th June 2023
- Interviews: Week of the 26th June 2023
- Publication of the final selection: Week of the 3rd July 2023
5. Selection criteria
The applications will be examined by a jurywhich will evaluate the applications according to the following criteria (out of 100 points):
| CRITERIA |
Values |
Points |
| APPLICATION |
|
Any incomplete application will be rejected |
| MEDIA ORGANISATION |
|
30 |
|
Consistency between the objectives of Equal Voices project and the media editorial line |
10 |
|
Professionalism of the media, capacity to produce, disseminate and promote content |
10 |
|
Technical, financial and human resources to enable participation in the project |
10 |
| PAIR OF JOURNALISTS |
|
40 |
|
Availability and willingness to participate in the project |
10 |
|
Motivation of journalists in building their capacity in the field of gender equality |
20 |
|
The media presents at least one female candidate in the pair |
10 |
| MEDIA MANAGER |
|
20 |
|
Motivation for the implementation of an internal project related to equality between women and men |
20 |
| TOTAL |
|
100 |
If you have any questions, please write to abigail@mfwa.org and esther.krawczyk@cfi.fr, and specify in the subject line “Call for applications for Equal Voices”.
