The US Ambassador Opens a Media Hub and Mediation Room at KAFU

On January 23, 2023, at the Kazakh-American Free University, with the participation of the Ambassador of the United States of America Daniel Rosenblum, the grand opening of a modern media hub for journalists and a mediation room took place. These educational professional platforms were created as part of two US Embassy Small Grants programs – “Media Literacy as a Key to Building a Competent Media Consumption Society among Teenagers, Professional Journalists, and University Teachers to Build Society’s Resilience to Disinformation” and “Developing Mediation Skills as a Way to Prevent and Resolve Conflicts in Educational Environment”.

KAFU President Yerezhep Mambetkaziev, Rector Aidar Mambetkaziev, public representatives, directors of Ust-Kamenogorsk schools, teachers and students of the university took part in the opening ceremony of the classrooms.

Grant projects are aimed at raising the level of the information culture of society, and also contribute to the formation of tolerant behavior in the educational environment.

A university-based media hub is a platform for immersing participants in the practical experience of working as a journalist and applying the acquired knowledge in practice. Mediahub will be a co-working space that brings together young people who want to be creative, showcase their talents, express their opinion on current events and share it with others, as well as media professionals who want to create their own projects. Students learn how to create content, behave in social networks, compose texts, shoot video and images, edit films and sound, mastering the basics of journalism in a media hub. Professional journalists and freelancers will find the necessary space and equipment to work on their projects.

The mediation room is opened for students, university teachers, directors, deputy directors, class teachers, social educators, school psychologists, school inspectors, representatives of the parent committee of schools in order to master the skills of using mediative methods of conflict resolution in the educational environment.

The planned activities to be held in the office are aimed at raising the level of culture of tolerant behavior in the educational environment, preventing cases of suicide and bullying.

The university-based mediation room will become a model for opening future school mediation rooms in schools in the districts of the East Kazakhstan region, which will be equipped with special stands and teaching materials on the project’s issues.

To date, more than 40 students and students of the city’s schools have taken part in the work of the project “Media Literacy as a Key to Forming a Competent Media Consumption Society among Teenagers, Professional Journalists and University Teachers to Increase Society’s Resilience to Disinformation”, within the framework of the project “Developing Mediation Skills as a Way to Prevention and Resolution of Conflicts in the Educational Environment” is attended by more than 400 participants from 82 schools of the East Kazakhstan region.

Center for Public Relations