Northerners receive training for media careers

People living in northern Saskatchewan now have access to the same type of media training offered in the southern part of the province, thanks to the Aboriginal media arts organization Y'utthe Askiy's Oski Achimowin/Honi Gothe Elel Daholni, Inc.

The organization has already held two workshops teaching basic video skills, with participants writing, editing and shooting three minute long stories. In November, it added another workshop to its list of offerings when it held Cikastipayicikan Iskwiwak/Ts Ekue Yenathe Nare Tay/Women Standing in Front of Camera.

Seven women took part in the training, held in La Ronge Nov. 18 and 19, learning about all aspects of radio and television news, from how to use the equipment to how to write a script to how to handle themselves in front of the camera.

Angie Campbell is an editor with Missinipi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) TV and is director of Y'utthe Askiy Productions, Ltd., a small production company that operates within MBC. She said the women's workshop was held to help meet a need for more qualified people to work in radio and television in the north.

To find people to fill positions, MBC has had to recruit many of its employees from the south, Campbell said. "Then they would stay one year, two years. There was never anyone that would stay for a long period of time."

The solution to the problem was to create a northern media arts organization that could train more northerners.

Hiring people from the north is also advantageous because they're more familiar with the communities they are covering.

"Because then they know the languages. They know the different dialects and just the way northern people are ... it's their communities. They know how things work," Campbell said. "There's something about being from a community and telling from that perspective, because it's different."

The organization added the women's workshop to help participants feel more comfortable both in front of and behind the camera.

"Because we go out in the community and the women would be afraid to speak," Campbell said. "They were so scared of that camera. They didn't want to have anything to do with it. They'd put their hands in front of their faces or they'd just walk off. There was always that reaction."

Among those sharing their expertise with the workshop participants were author, playwright, filmmaker and educator Maria Campbell, APTN national news host Nola Wuttunee and MBC on-air host and radio technician Larissa Burnouf.

In the end, each of the workshop participants left with new skills, a better understanding of radio and television news production, and new confidence, Campbell said.

"The comments that I heard myself were, 'Was that it?' The fear that they first had was minimized in the end. And they knew that it's just a camera and this is what it does."

Many of the women may get a chance to put what they've learned to good use in the future by actually covering news within their home communities.

"If ever we went to a community and did a news story, then those would be the people that we would call to maybe get more training in front of the camera to do a story," Campbell said.

While the workshop held in November was the first one offered specifically for women, it probably won't be the last. Information about the workshop has spread, and a number of women have expressed interest in taking part in similar training. The women that took part in the initial workshop want to take other workshops to learn more, and even a few men have come forward, wondering why they're being excluded from the program.

"Because the demand was so great we have to do it over again. So hopefully we'll just rotate to different communities," Campbell said. "La Ronge was our first one, but we could have it in any northern community because we have portable equipment."