They are the linchpins of both Press Week and Press Day at school set to take place next Tuesday at the Palais Nikaïa and at Jules Romains college.
Jacqueline Quehen and Patrick Florion share their thoughts on this fifth edition, which has become a not-to-be-missed event of the spring in the Azure coast.
Nice Première: Jacqueline, Patrick, can you tell us about this Press Week and the Junior Journalist Day?
Jacqueline Quehen: The Press and Media Week at school has become the must-attend spring event. Since Monday, in schools, colleges, and high schools, we have been flipping through newspapers, observing them, comparing newscasts, dissecting agency dispatches, and conversing with journalists… When I say ‘we’, I mean students of all ages (even from kindergarten!), backgrounds, and levels… What is done quietly throughout the year takes on an impressive scale during this period, which lasts two weeks in the Nice Academy. We realize that young people are passionate about the press and media in all its forms and that current events interest them… Yet, it is crucial to teach them to decode, to be active and critical with information, in short, to act as citizens… And that’s the goal of this operation!
The Junior Journalist Day, on the other hand, is the highlight. 2000 youths, 130 journalists, media personalities, or public figures—it’s quite something! It offers high school and middle school students a unique opportunity to meet all those who “make” the news, among which are big names like Ivan Levaï, Eric Zemmour, Antoine Vitkine, Jean-Claude Allanic… and many others!
Patrick Florion: It’s primarily a grand media festival, bringing together in one place 1500 high school and middle school students from across the academy, and 120 media professionals, artists, and musicians. It’s also a meeting between classes engaged in work about the press. This day allows for the exchange of experiences, their valorization, and the launch of new projects. It puts young people in a situation where they create TV segments, articles, and radio segments with real professionals. By becoming “junior journalists” for a day, they better understand the constraints and functioning of the media, becoming active users.
Nice Première: Nice is highlighted this year. Why this choice?
JQ: We solicited establishments throughout the Academy (Var and Alpes-Maritimes) to host this 5th edition. Jules Romains College, which quickly volunteered, perfectly met our selection criteria: a dynamic educational team, a media-focused project, an enthusiastic principal… But also an exceptional geographical situation with the proximity of Nikaïa and Nice-Matin where some of the activities will take place.
And after being held at the sub-prefecture in 2005, we could only aim for a prefecture…
Indeed, choosing a major city is also a mark of a significant acceleration for this Day, both in the number of students participating and in the quantity and quality of the speakers (including Nice Première!).
Naturally, this was only possible thanks to the support of the city of Nice, which is the co-organizer of the event, and of the CANCA, which allows students to travel to the locations…
PF: The Junior Journalist Day takes place this year in three highly symbolic places: the College Jules Romains, so involved in multiple press projects over the years that one forgets it is located in a sensitive area, the Palais Nikaïa, which for the youth is synonymous with party and spectacle, and the headquarters of Nice-Matin, the daily closest to our young audience. Could we dream of a better choice?
Nice Première: What will be the events of this 2006 edition, the fifth of its name?
JQ: The events of this fifth JJJ (Junior Journalist Day) first and foremost include renowned journalists, who have kindly, out of passion for the youth and their craft, agreed to come and speak: it’s Ivan Levaï, who will address the question of the journalist’s bias; it’s Antoine Vitkine, who will explore the conspiracy theory; it’s Eric Zemmour, who will talk about his_experience as a major reporter… And also, round tables, workshops, exhibitions, artist performances… It would be too long to enumerate everything!
PF: This year, Parisian journalists will travel to the event: Antoine Vitkine, Jean Claude Allanic, Ivan Levaï, Frédéric Schlesinger, and other major names from the national media will offer conferences on biases, clandestine advertising, conspiracies… Eric Zemmour will explain how a journalist can find themselves thrust under the media’s spotlight. A hundred workshops will offer young participants the chance to discover all the facets of this fascinating world. Musicians and artists will give this day the festive aspect that makes it so magical.
Nice Première: What do you think about a web newspaper in schools, middle schools, and high schools in the department?
JQ: A newspaper that unites the different institutions would be an excellent idea! Certainly, each establishment has its cyberjournal, but a large area for civic expression for the youth would be welcome!
PF: It’s an opportunity to discover the constraints and possibilities of the press. In writing the articles, the youth learn differently. They discover others, tolerance, and listening by working together. Participating in a school newspaper helps the youth become the autonomous and lucid citizens needed for the future.
Nice Première: What is your best memory of the previous editions?
JQ: Without hesitation, the discussions that started among the students, their enthusiasm in creating the newspaper… And, indeed, it’s them who should be asked this question: we mainly see the backstage of the Junior Journalist Day, we are familiar mostly with its long, fascinating, and feverish preparation…
PF: My best memories: the radio workshop that allowed about ten budding young reporters to completely produce a show. Their pride, their joy was a pleasure to see when they heard themselves the next day on the air! And then the amazed looks of these middle schoolers in front of the giant screens of a cyberjournal. Finally, the silence when, on the microphone, a call was read for the release of Florence Aubenas.
Nice Première: Finally, what do you hope for this new edition?
JQ: If the day unfolds in keeping with our commitment to media education, and the passion of all the professionals for their noble mission, this edition can only be successful!
PF: That it fulfills its two objectives: to create a desire to frequent the media, to shape active users, conscious of the stakes of information. That it leaves all these young participants with memories of a day of festivity, meeting, whose magic will subsequently extend in their classes.
