What I learned from Edward R. Murrow Program By Adil Sakhawat

Photo: Edward R. Murrow Fellows at Newseum in Washington D.C, a museum which gives a complete idea transformation about American journalism. The photo was taken in front of the relic of 9/11 inside the Newseum.

The program was an eye opener for me as it made me to think about doing something with student journalism in Bangladesh.

The 21 days journey to USA started with knowing about how federalism works in USA and what is the importance of press freedom in American constitution and it continued to an ending after experiencing more about investigative journalism in USA and how the American journalists practicing professional journalism from an early stage of their career.

In between, we the Multi-Regional Edward R. Murrow fellows from 24 countries under International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) witnessed the Mid-Term election of USA and how the people of USA actively participated in the election.

Our program started from Washington D.C where we got opportunity to visit the White House, United States Capital building, Department of State.

From Washington D.C we went to Tulsa of Oklahoma State. From Tulsa the whole group was divided into four different groups and were sent to four cities of four states which were Akron in Ohio State, Columbia in South Carolina State, East Lansing in Michigan State and Syracuse in New York State.

Photo: WSYR-TV is an ABC-affiliated television station licensed to Syracuse, New York. Edward R. Murrow fellows (Syracuse team) after experiencing Live Telecast from the WSYR TV studio.

After Washington D.C our whole trip was designed with lots of meeting with investigative journalists and cultural events from where we got to know about impressive journalism works across the USA and how media operates in USA.

During those visits we also met with Native American people and their cultures which is vast in one word and that gave me an impression, America has a different picture behind what we know.

Imagine this country has lots of Native American newspaper which solely focus on the Native American community-based issue and some of those newspapers are 150 years old and still operates successfully with all the changes time to time as the generation changed a lot.

I was in the Syracuse of New York state team. Basically after visiting there I felt something to implement or initiate after coming back to Bangladesh, my home country.

Not only in New York state, in other states as well the American universities have lots of students publications both print and electronic, even other digital forms as well which are not only covering the university campuses or the students affairs but also the whole city or states.

Interestingly, their coverage often become a national issue. The Journalism schools in USA time to time initiates big investigative journalism project under supervision of journalism experienced professors by the journalism students which become front page headline of the international American news outlets.

In Syracuse, I visited The Daily Orange and Citrus TV, a completely student run newspaper and Television in Syracuse, Central New York I found how the journalism students are practicing professional journalism from early stage of their life which led them to become best journalist in future.

We the Edward R. Murrow fellows visited Manship School of Mass Communication in Louisiana State University to gain insight into the Cold Case Project Investigations and its outcome. The investigation was entirely done by the journalism students where they got information under the Freedom of Information Act and came up with in-depth investigative stories.

My main point is in Bangladesh there are few journalism schools and also we have some good newspapers and televisions. So if these popular news outlets can make some collaboration with the journalism schools to work on some potential investigative stories that will not only led to some good journalism pieces but also the students who will work on those stories will find themselves as a future potential journalist of Bangladesh.

Our impressive journey ends in New Orleans of Louisiana which is called the city of Jazz, where the people introduce their city New Orleans ‘where Jazz is born, dies and reborn everyday with multi-cultural people.

Adil Sakhawat, a Bangladeshi journalist, recently participated in the Edward R. Murrow Program for Journalists, 2018.