A four-day investigative Journalism Training Workshop has concluded today,27th March 2025, at Mount Kigali University Campus, conducted by Fojo Media Institute through its Rwanda Media Programme.
Steve Buist, a veteran Canadian journalist, training students on the practical part of coming up with a news story
Throughout the training sessions, students were able to delve into the fundamental aspects of investigative journalism through highly practical and interactive sessions that offered hands-on experience from day one until the end.
The training led by Steve Buist, a retired Canadian investigative journalist, was intended to equip the 15 student participants with essential skills in investigative journalism, data journalism, and health/medical reporting.
Students were reminded of the need to always stick to the truth and be fair and balanced when reporting investigative stories and other journalistic forms.
“The in-depth skills I acquired are so much, for example, editing and analysis skills. And these will help me in my journalism career. Stated one of the participants, Denish Ondieki, a first-year journalism student. “ The approach used was so positive and inclusive.
Denish Ondieki presents one of their group’s pieces generated after the theoretical training part of news writing on press releases.
Gihozo Uwase Lina expressed her satisfaction with how the sessions were conducted as well, “About Steve! Actually, I wish he could be my mentor for a very long time, because he teaches you and you get to actually understand what he is saying without much struggle.” says first year Lina on the final day of the training.
“So I’m grateful for the people that made it possible for us to be able to meet someone as wonderful as Steve.”
Lina Gihozo, a first-year journalism student in the middle, during the training session, extended her vote of thanks to Steve for the wonderful mentorship delivered.
Steve, has over 40 years of experience in mentorship and investigative reporting maintained a friendly tone and atmosphere during the sessions, which laid a welcome note for students to freely express their ideas as he mentored and guided the students through the process of coming up with stories that not only inform, but also transforms through solutions.
He highlighted the various ways of utilizing press releases to identify the newsworthy parts that resonate with your readership and further stressed the most important parts a journalist shouldn’t miss out on when reporting on court proceedings, also pointing out a no-go zone area on court matters for journalists.
“The students were thirsty for knowledge, so eager to learn, and so happy to be taught some practical things about journalism. They were so warm and engaged in what we were doing and were so receptive.” Steve Buist, the mentor for the four-day workshop, told the MKU Magazine.
“I think they’re happy to get a chance to be able to practise the process of writing a news story right from the ground up and learning how to structure a news story.”
Students have a task at hand of putting to work all the skills gained throughout the course of the Workshop as well as sharing them with those fellow students who were unlucky to attend.
“It was a great experience to be able to try to take some of the knowledge I have from a long career in journalism and try to share some of it with journalists who are just starting and learning about the business,” Steve said. “ The four days were just a wonderful experience.”
Steve with a gifted T-shirt from the group of students that was given to him as a way of expressing how grateful and thankful they were after the training.
Fojo Media Institute, through Rwanda Media Programme outcome 2, professionalization of the media landscape in Rwanda, continues to offer such opportunities for mentorships by experts to student journalists in higher learning institutions as part of the efforts to prepare them for the evolving media landscape.
Participants pose for a group photo after the successful sessions on the 4-day training
