Top journalists from the New York Times and CNN head to Prague for summer school

As part of the 9th annual Journey: Journalism Bootcamp, participants can expect lectures on topics related to practical journalism. Investigative journalism star Adam Entous will guide this year's participants through journalistic ethics and working with sources. Entous is the winner of two Pulitzer Prizes for his reporting on the Russian invasion of Ukraine and for his investigaiton of Russian influence in the U.S. presidential election, and has recently written primarily about the family affairs of current U.S. President Joe Biden.

Another Pulitzer Prize winner who will be attending Journey as a speaker is Ben Taub, a reporter for The New Yorker magazine. He won the prestigious award in 2020 for his article "Guantanamo's Darkest Secrets," in which he exposed brutal interrogation practices at the notorious U.S. prison. His lesson will explore the moral question marks and issues that arise when journalism touches the lives of real people.

Students will also gain insight into photojournalism. The lecture on this topic will be led by industry legend, documentary filmmaker and photographer Kate Brooks, who has spent 3 years following the story of the most endangered animals on the planet, the northern white rhino. As part of the filming of her movie "The Last Animals", she visited the Czech Republic a few years ago, where she photographed the female Nabiré, at the time the last individual of her species in Europe. Along the way to a successful TV report, CNN's Evan Perez, a well-known Washington correspondent who has reported extensively on topics such as Mueller's investigation into the Trump 2016 election campaign.

In addition to the lecture blocks, students will also receive hands-on field instruction. Under the guidance of two senior Reuters correspondents, participants will rehearse live interviews or live on-air interviews. At the end, Jeremy Druker, Matt Stearns and Tyler Foggatt will pass on their experience.

The ten-day course, which will take place in Prague's Villa Grébovka, will culminate in the submission of individual papers. In the last edition, aspiring journalists wrote articles on topics such as whether social media can be a form of therapy, how Czechs provide financial aid to pregnant Polish women, and the European Commission's distortion of competition in Hungary.

The summer project Journey: Journalism Bootcamp is open to students from a total of 15 countries, including the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, Ukraine, the UK and the USA, as well as Georgia, Armenia and Belarus. The Foundation has provided participants with a full scholarship covering all costs associated with attending the Journey - including accommodation, travel costs and meals. 

For more information about the program, visit https://www.bakalafoundation.org/en/programs/journey/.