By Tulinagwe Malopa.

With ever increasing climate change challenges, renewable energy stands as one of the major solutions that can make the earth a livable planet. Increasing the supply of renewable energy will allow us to overcome crisis like global warming and improve public health.

The use of renewable energy which involves wind, solar, geothermal, and hydro has been a hot topic when we talk about climate change. As a journalist, this is an opportunity for you to learn more about renewable energy and how to report stories associated with the industry.

Why should we invest in renewable energy reporting?

It might be a question to many on how renewable energy connects or mainly involve journalists and the benefits involved in reporting such stories.

Renewable energy touches almost everyone including journalists who can report articles all about it. It is all about sources for our homes, schools, hospitals, factories and many other sectors that depends on such energy to run.

Moreover, renewable energy protects the environment for future generations as we mainly depend on it on reducing deforestation and air pollution.

Nukta Africa with their partners Hivos and Energy Change Lab have been pushing for practical trainings for journalists to help them acquire basic skills on reporting the industry. The series of training and fellowship is meant to boost the uptake of renewable energy in the East African nation.

As one of the initiatives in prioritizing reporting such articles, a critical selection of journalists is done in order to get ambitious journalists who are willing to learn and use the knowledge attained to deliver analytical renewable energy news that can help improve lives in both rural and urban areas.

What are the secrets behind winning training opportunity

One of the most frequently asked questions from some of the journalists is what they should do to win the Renewable Energy Journalism. Most of these journalists who asks this question are those who didn’t make to the top 20.

Like any recruitment program, there are set criteria that any applicant should meet to be selected. The following are issues that journalists should consider when applying for such opportunities in order to create a chance for him/her to participate in the fellowship.

High level of seriousness.

When filling the application forms make sure you answer the questions properly.

Many journalists rush to fill in the forms without proper preparations as we have seen many applicants discredited due to the level of seriousness. Seriousness can easily been noted from how journalists write and present his or her arguments. In the worst case some writes they write their names in small letters and can’t even distinguish where to put small and capital letters. Judges doesn’t tolerate much the application with grammatical errors that makes hard to understand.

Be precise, show your ideas

Some of these applications require you to share news ideas on the topics they are applying for. If you really want to win, make sure your ideas are precise and are well understood. You don’t need to write 500 words if the idea is doable and clear. Not all applications systems have word limits. Practice yourself from avoiding writing long texts like a thesis. Some of judges doesn’t prefer reading an application with long texts.

Attaching all necessary documents needed.

Necessary documents are essential when required by organisers. When you are required to attach them as part of meeting the application requirements, please do because those who fails to attach them are disqualified.

Most of these attachments are related to applicants editors endorsements or past works done by a journalist applying for the opportunity. The organizers will trust the applicant once all required documents are provided. Make sure all documents are original and follow formal standards.

As an applicant who desire participating in various events or fellowships that involves applications, strive to concentrate in all the necessary elements that must be considered for you to win a chance. There is no any other secret success on winning applications than clarity in ideas, seriousness in application, attach documents and be careful on unnecessary grammatical errors.

Tulinagwe Malopa is the Communication & Event Management Lead at Nukta Africa. She also covers Innovation and Technology beat at www.nukta.co.tz.

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