Learning Security

Session structure

Our workshops typically began with a brief demonstration of some sort, followed by an interactive discussion and a short lecture about the material we would cover. An hour or two of hands-on work with relevant tools—including discussions of trade-offs and threat-modeling scenarios—came next, and accounted for the majority of the session. Our workshops ended with a brief summary and a Q&A session, leaving ten to fifteen minutes to address any previous questions that had been deferred in the interest of staying on track. With few exceptions, the scenarios we used to contextualize threats and frame the opportunities afforded by strong information-security practices were either chosen for their relevance to the challenges journalists face in general, or were volunteered by students themselves. As NGO sector trainers with limited journalism experience, the opportunity to participate in a handful of journalism school courses and immerse ourselves in community events proved invaluable in this respect.