Lindsay Redifer, FOKO Blog Club's First Vidcasts, the Majunga School of Journalism, the mini blogging contest, …

We got introduced to Lindsay Redifer thanks to the Rising Voices newsletter. Lindsay is a Peace Corps Volunteer stationed in Madagascar who stayed on to teach English at Majunga's Journalism school. She also has a keen interest in citizen journalism and loves Madagascar, as she so powerfully describes in her interview by Pati . She became our Blog Club's enthusiastic tutor in Majunga, Madagascar's third city, on its western coast.

Majunga's new citizen journalists are not only showing great promise but are already realizing them. The posts are engaging, numerous and in three languages : Malagasy, French and English. Take a look at the posts, translated in English here. Subjects range from the universally controversial one of abortion, to posts dedicated to Malagasy customs. We also have a slam poet !

We want to thank Lindsay wholeheartedly for her hardwork and dedication. Words are not enough. Lindsay is now leaving Madagascar for good and we wish her greatest success in her search to do more citizen journalism related work. Mirary soa ary misaotra betsaka, Lindsay !

Lindsay and Hery, the UN Youth Club Coordinator and FBC mentor, assisted also the young but talented Nombana and Pati in editing and producing their first vidcasts. They only needed some nudging and pointers to come up with real short documentaries. One is about the life of Dominique, a child beggar in Antananarivo. Another one is about the infamous lake of Behoririka in Antananarivo, a sad case of urban pollution disaster. Both were submitted to the Film Your Issue competition.

Thanks to Lindsay, our bloggers are also getting a special column in the Madagascar English Journal, a weekly publication for educational purposes distributed to schools and sponsored by the American embassy.

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And lastly, the last FOKO Blog Club session with new bloggers was held on April 26th. A joint one again with Majunga and Toamasina blog clubs participating. This time we have put some of our confirmed bloggers, Karenichia and Patricia in charge. There was no chatrooms for diasporic bloggers to cheer on the new bloggers. But the blogosphere was still present to discuss Lapino and Dadarabe's cyberfety and to discover the new blogs.

We are working hard on providing more pictures, more podcasting and more vidcasting workshops.

We also held our first mini blogging contests. Results were announced. The winner will get a digital camera to take more pictures and make vidcasts, the others will get internet connexion, with special mentions to some very special ones who will be promoted to be mentors.

5 thoughts on “Lindsay Redifer, FOKO Blog Club's First Vidcasts, the Majunga School of Journalism, the mini blogging contest, …

  1. It is sad to see Lindsay go, but it is so inspiring to see the blossoms of some of the seeds she helped plant. I’m looking forward to getting to know each of the Mahajanga bloggers over the next weeks and months.

  2. I actually dropped few tears while chatting with her before she was leaving. Her Mahajanga students are incredibly talented, beautiful, activist and very very very generous.

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