Kazretipress- A media town created by students in Kazreti

The website “Kazretipress” is founded by students in the Kazreti district of Bolnisi municipality. Journalists, cameramen and website designers, that’s what they are. 11 pupils of Kazreti N1 public school have been actively telling their audience about the school, township and region news since January of this year.

Their office is a single room within the school premises. The members of the team, with their own resources, organized and step into the media space with great enthusiasm.

The idea of creating “Kazretipress” belongs to the teacher of the same school, journalist Nino Melikishvili.  We are proud to mention that Nino was a member of our organization and she is a former journalist as well

She says that she decided to establish a media centre when she saw interest and desire for doing something valuable among the students. Today, her involvement in the activities of the media organization is kept to a minimum. Nino is in the advisory board and the journalists of “Kazretipress” turn to her for advice

Students aged 13-17 have multimedia skills. They formulate the mission and vision of the website themselves and currently work on expanding the audience.

“ The main goal is to provide Kvemo Kartli Audience with balanced information” – says Nino Melikishvili

 5 out of 11 journalists of Kazretipress are also doing editing work.  Materials are published in English too. You will learn about the events held at the Kazreti school, as well as about the projects planned or implemented throughout the municipality from the website. For example, one of the information refers to the announcement of a tender for the construction of a garden in Kazreti. Also, they covered the meeting with the Mayor of Bolnisi and the International Children’s Day in Bolnisi. They write interviews with their peers, write about different topics and make videos.

Nino Melikishvili emphasizes the fact that students want to be actively involved in the activities of their township and region and be useful to society. They are also working on signing a memorandum with other schools and trying to find freelance journalists.

“Adults often ignore what children say, we consider it not serious the children not only say what they have to say on Kazretipress, but also give other children the opportunity to express their opinion”, – Nino Melikishvili.

Kazretipress” journalists have already had to deal with various challenges. Lack of resources is one of them, but nevertheless, they try to achieve the maximum with their own efforts.

Nino Melikishvili talks about the daily  difficulties they have to overcome:

“Kazretipress first of all teaches us to fight for our own ideology. We are still young and children have already had to face such challenges as freedom from influences, struggle for resources, and the establishment of democratic governance. All of us are volunteers and the children realize that the world is built on volunteers, that engagement is the most important aspect of the community development process.”

Students’ independent journalistic activity is well-known among the residents of the district of Kazreti and Bolnisi municipality. Their media product, apart from school children, is also interesting for older people. They are actively working to be able to make and broadcast programs and want to contact their peers abroad.

Author: Guranda Phutkaraya

Azerbaijani translation: Chichak Guseynova

English translation: Tamar Cherkezishvili

 The article was created with the support of the Civil Society Institute, within the framework of the project " Civil Society Initiative: Sustainable, Open and Accountable Civil Society, Organizations for the Development of Georgia" funded by the European Union and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. Kvemo Kartli Media is fully responsible for its content and it may not reflect the views of the European Union or the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. The project is implemented by a consortium led by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAS) together with the following non-governmental organizations – Center for Strategic Research and Development of Georgia (CSRDG), Civil Society Institute (CSI), Counseling and Training Center (CTC), Education Development and Employment Center (EDEC) and European Institute of Policy (IEP).

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