“AFCN Fact Lab” Project: Spreading fact-checking culture to more than 3,600 trainees in 13 countries!
After receiving a 10 days intensive training during the “TOT” lab held at the Dead Sea in February 2024, 18 trainers flew back to their countries to train more than 3,600 journalists & students on the basics of fact-checking, as part of the “AFCNFactLab” project implemented by the ARIJ’s Arab Fact-Checkers Network (AFCN), and supported by Google News Initiative (GNI).
Over the course of five months, AFCNFactLab trainers provided more than 3,600 trainees, most of whom were university students and journalists, with over 179 workshops on the basics of fact-checking, which were held in 46 different cities based in 13 countries (Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Bahrain, Yemen, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Sudan, Morocco, Uganda, Germany, and Turkey).
The trainers designed their workshops to primarily focus on the basics of fact-checking, initially defining Information Disorder and its types, and moving to introducing fact-checking methodologies and its two major types, Pre- and Post-publication. Practical examples and applications of the learnt knowledge spanned the rest of the training, and priority given to the tools that proved to be essential to any fact-checker, such as Google reverse image search, InVID’s tool for video verification, among others.
The trainings has succeeded in raising awareness on the importance of fact-checking, and improving skills to identify the different types of mis/disinformation, this impact greatly depicted on social media through the hashtag #AFCNFactlab on Facebook, Instagram, and X platform. The impact of these trainings was also evident in the entities it targeted:
– Some universities took the initiative to adopt the idea of introducing Fact-checking to their educational curricula of media colleges, while others stressed to continue these kind of training and provide advanced ones during the new academic year.
– Journalists in media institutions emphasised the importance of the field of fact-checking and its close relation with the journalistic work, and many of them expressed their willingness to develop and improve such skills that will greatly enhance their work.
– Trainees from Sudan launched a fact-checking initiative called “Rasidoon“, as they felt the necessity and the need for countering mis/disinformation streams surrounding the war that tears up their country.
– Many WhatsApp chat groups used during the trainings have turned into “small factchecking platforms” by the trainees, who continuously monitor the news and social media and fact-check any information they doubt, under the supervision of AFCNFactLab trainers.
– Many educational and media entities have contacted AFCN and the trainers during and after the project concluded seeking for more training, thus signifying the importance of such training.
AFCNFactLab trainers also expressed the impact they achieved going through this experience, as they all agreed on the continuity of these trainings and targeting new educational and media organisations, in addition to the tremendous experiences and opportunities they gained, to fight mis/disinformation and spread fact-checking culture on a wider scale.
AFCNFactLab project is considered one of the projects of AFCN that fulfil its strategic goals, especially networking and capacity building, by spreading fact-checking culture and creating a competent Arab fact-checkers in various fields, as the project succeeded in signifying the importance of fact-checking and delivering the basic skills to various media and educational institutions, in more than 13 countries!
