What is e-MONITOR?

Download the e-MONITOR Learning Guide

A Media Literacy Approach to Deciding What’s News

e-MONITOR is a learning guide to teach news curation. Written by journalists as well as educators and students across disciplines, e-MONITOR teaches news curation by asking three key questions:

• What events and issues are news? e-MONITOR directs users to examine the content of individual media outlets
• Do all news outlets select the same events and issues to feature? e-MONITOR asks users to compare news content in one outlet to that produced–in the same news cycle–by other news organizations in the same region and across the world
• What news stories should be emphasized in one’s own media outlet? e-MONITOR challenges users to make their own choices of what news to feature for their own audiences.

At the Salzburg Academy, for example, where eMONITOR is a part of the academic curriculum, students from around the world look at dozens of news outlets every morning (see list of outlets below) to find out how news outlets are covering topics of global importance. In the summer of 2009, the topics that students surveyed for coverage were : Free Expression, Global Health, Justice & Rights, Security, and Sustainability.

At the start of each Academy morning, students work to identify what stories about these topics are being told, and how prominently. After initial surveying, students meet together with each other and ask questions about the stories they found and how they illuminate (or not) the topics: What are these stories saying about this topic? What are the main issues being covered? How is this story framing the issue? Is there an agenda? If so, how is it evident?

Guided by this question period, students then select what they consider to be the top stories from news outlets around the world and publish them daily, with an accompanying synthesis that outlines the day’s stories from all over the world. A main story is highlighted each day, but links of numerous stories are linked to for further reading. The goal of eMONITOR is to use media literacy to explore how media sets a global agenda around issues of global importance. Each day, diverse stories are published, with the aim to show a more inclusive look at how the world is telling stories about community, culture, and citizenship.

e-Latin America:

eMONITOR es una iniciativa de la Academia Salzburg sobre Medios y Cambio Global. En este monitor de medios 48 estudiantes de más de diez países siguen y analizan día a día la cobertura que dan los medios en inglés, español y chino a noticias sobre libertad de expresión, salud global, justicia y derechos humanos, seguridad y sustentabilidad. Once estudiantes latinoamericanos de la Academia revisan especialmente la información sobre estos temas en 15 medios de 10 países de la región.

e-China:

是基于中国媒体每日报道的一个跟踪和介绍项目，由2009年萨尔斯堡媒介学院的中国籍学生共同完成。作为一个学习项目，E-China旨在2009年7月28日至8月11日期间，跟踪中国几家主要媒体的每日报道，并选择其中涵盖了可持续发展、公共健康、法治、教育、社会等多个领域的重要新闻进行研究性转载。建立E-China的目的是关注中国媒体的报道议题，提升中外学生的媒介素养，同时向萨尔斯堡媒介学院的各国师生介绍中国社会，传递中国的声音，让他们更好的了解真实的中国。