Sri Lankan Youth Sharpen Skills in Media Literacy

Youth Leaders in ten districts in Sri Lanka recently concluded a three month training in Media Literacy.

The programme was conducted by Rainbow Resources Lanka, the sister company of Rainbow Institute of Communication and English, with the support of the American Center of the United States Embassy.

The 30 hour training was conducted online for a group of 200 youth. They were selected from amongst a large number that applied. They were awarded full scholarships. For the media literacy programme. The training was carried out through centers in Colombo, Negambo, Kurunegala, Jaffna, Trincomalee, Batticaloa, Vavuniya, Matara, Galle and Kandy

As the environment both locally and globally is becoming more and more challenging and competitive for young people , media literacy has become an essential skill for them to go forward in their lives and careers.

The training offered by Rainbow Resources Lanka and the American Centre was implemented to upskill bright youth and help them understand this important topic area.

HIGHLIGHTS

The training was conducted by University Lecturers in Media and Senior Journalists, under the direction of eminent academic, Dr Mahim Mendis.

Topics covered were: What is Media literacy and why learn about it? , role and responsibility of Media in a Democracy, The Media landscape in Sri Lanka and journalists rights , Right to Information and accessing RTI in Sri Lanka , Media ethics, regulation and self – regulation, with special reference to mechanisms in Sri Lanka. Context sensitivity, pluralism and gender , Using multiple sources, Recognising fake news, hate speech and bias ,

“Even if we haven’t seen one another physically, I feel very close to my trainers and my colleagues in the media literacy training I wish we could have another extra month! Anyway iI take this time to express my deep gratitude to our trainers for giving us the best.”

- Kanchana Kumari, Kurunegala

“A big thank you to the American Center and Rainbow Institute for having organized such a a wonderful media literacy course. We were able to garner so much information. We are very grateful to you! We found the course very useful and were able to enhance our skills. We were able to critically analyze topics and co relate his information to what is happening in the country. The course was very interesting. I am very grateful.” - Gurusingharaja, Jaffna

Gauging Tone and Language and understanding images , Data Journalism- Questioning Numbers and Figures, Digital issues and Shaping the Media as responsible youth leaders

As in all trainings conducted by Rainbow Resources Lanka and the Rainbow Institute of Communication, modern international training techniques with Fun- filled activity based methodology were used.

ENROLLING FOR PUBLIC SPEAKING AND BUSINESS ENGLISH

The Rainbow Institute is currently enrolling students for the next intake of it’s highly sought after training on Public Speaking for Youth and Adults and also for it’s training for Cambridge Business English

Trainings are offered online and physically at the Rainbow Institute training center in Colombo, following Covid 19 health guideless and confining to small groups to ensure personalised attention. Rainbow Institute is also continuing it’s tailor made corporate training packages in English, . Communication and Soft skills for employees at all levels.

“I wish to extend my heartfelt thanks to the Rainbow Institute and American Center. I truly appreciate the hard work of the coordinator Mr. Douglas, visiting lecturers and our instructor Ms.Vanitha. . Your dedication and professionalism inspired us to follow this programme without any difficulty. We gained much knowledge that will be a great support to us in the future. The sessions were conducted in an extremely interesting manner”

- Viji Vignesh, Vavuniya