This was DW-AKADEMIE’s first TV workshop in Iraq. From February 14 – 25, DW-AKADEMIE instructor Daniela Leese travelled to Sulaimania in northern Iraq to continue with a project she had begun last year: children’s television in Iraq. “Last October we held a workshop in Jordan for three Iraqi teams. We then chose the best team and in February travelled to their broadcaster - Khak TV - to continue the project on site,” Daniela Leese explains.

Together with 16 journalists, camera operators, video editors, sound engineers and presenters, the DW-AKADEMIE team drew up a concept for future programs. Each will contain four main segments: an explanatory report called “How to make…,” a report by child correspondents called “A journey to…,” a portrait of an exceptional child from the region, and as a fun element, a short film about a magic trick or the like.

“We first planned three complete programs. We then chose one and began producing it,” Daniela Leese explains. The portrait and the short film are now finished. “The participants are going to produce the remaining two reports in the next few weeks, and then produce the entire program on their own – including the presentation and the trailer,” says Leese. All participants are highly motivated, including Faraidon M. Salih, a sound engineer and video editor with Khak TV. “There are many reasons for producing good children programs,” he says. “The most important one is that they give children the opportunity to learn something about the society they live in. Good children’s programming can help put them on the right track.”

For the last four years, DW-AKADEMIE has been working with one of its cooperation partners, the Goethe-Institut, to make children’s programming popular in Iraq. “With the current project we are where we were aiming to be - with the television makers and the children in Iraq”, Daniela Leese sums up. This April, the DW-AKADEMIE team is returning to Sulaymaniyah for a final consultation. “The goal is to broadcast the children’s program every two weeks, and then perhaps later on a weekly basis”.