In the first round, Media4Change received 20 (in Lithuania) and European Dialogue received 19 (in Slovakia) entries from both individual journalists and teams of journalists. 

Journalists had the opportunity to choose one of three thematic areas on which they would like to focus their investigative work: environment, human rights, corruption.

In Lithuania, most of the applicants were interested in Human Rights (9), which was followed by corruption (7) and environmental topics (4). While in Slovakia most of the applicants were pitching environmental topics (9 applications), then corruption (6), and human rights (5).

On Tuesday, March 23rd, the application for the first round of the Competition was closed and then the applications were sent to the members of the expert Juries, who were evaluating them according to two criteria:

• Potential to conduct an investigation: members of the Juries paid attention to the professional experiences and educational background of the candidates;
• Motivation to participate in the Competition and conduct an investigation.

For each criterion, the application could get points on a scale from 1 (weak) to 10 (very good). The points were then summed up and divided by the number of members of each national Jury. 

The Applications with the best scores were selected to pass to the second round.  All applicants were notified of results of the first round and invited to attend workshops and submit their full investigation proposals within the second round.

• Lithuania on April 2nd.
• Slovakia on April 7th.

NISI and European Dialogue are also very pleased with the positive responses from the experts on journalism, media, and three thematic areas, both highly experienced academicians and practitioners. An invitation to become a member of the Juries was accepted by, for example:

You can find updated lists of Jury members of Lithuanian and Slovak parts of the Competition on Media4Change website.

What awaits us now?

During the second round, the journalists will have the opportunity to discuss with others, form teams, and specify their investigation topics in the upcoming creative workshops. There they will meet and learn from experts on investigative journalism, media innovation, and all three thematic areas (environment, corruption, human rights). 

During the creative workshops the individual applicants will have an opportunity to find collaborators ideally among the other individual candidates. However, it will also be possible to join existing teams in the case of mutual interest. In this matchmaking process, the representatives of Media4Change or European Dialogue will provide help and advice.

Subsequently, teams will be formed to work on their proposals of investigations. The deadline for their submission is April 21st. The registration form for the second round will be published around April 10th, 2021.

Background 

The Local Investigative Journalism Fund is part of the Media4Change – Future Story Lab project. It’s run by the National Institute for Social Integration (Media4Change programme) and European Dialogue to encourage collaboration, innovations, excellency, and professional standards, and ultimately increase the quality of investigative journalism in Lithuania and Slovakia. The Local Investigative Journalism Competition aims to support journalists and media who create investigative stories of local significance focusing on issues of public interest, especially those that are not sufficiently covered or exposed at all.

The whole project is co-funded by the European Commission – DG CONNECT – under the 2019 call for proposals “Media freedom and investigative journalism”.

Disclaimer

This article represents the views of the authors only and is their sole responsibility. The European Commission does not accept any responsibility for the use that may be made of the information contained in this text.