El Observador of Castilla-La Mancha is a multimedia and online platform belonging to the teaching project of the Faculty of Communication from the public University of Castilla La-Mancha. Its main goals is to provide a space for the different subjects of the syllabus and other disciplines to develop a media work that reproduces the professional routines of contemporary digital newsrooms.
The objectives of El Observador are:
- To provide students with a platform to begin to build their journalistic profile and their personal curriculum, within a professional environment and guaranteeing an impact on the public space of Castilla-La Mancha.
- To serve as “lab of ideas”, where users can experiment with new discursive modes in journalism: radio, Internet, photojournalism, video and hypertext.
- As a didactic platform, its purpose is to serve as a learning method for students in the production of pieces of news and news coverage, so that they acquire the skills of the profession.
- To offer a meeting point for students, readers, professors and professionals of the media industry, to facilitate training and research, as well as the early recruitment of talent and the progressive insertion of students to the digital media market.
Students will be able to participate in El Observador. As a general rule, the best practices of each subject will be published, and students will be able to form part of the Editorial Board, composed by professors, technicians and students. Paid collaboration scholarships are announced each year to help meet the objectives of El Observador, apart from supporting teaching and research at the centre. There is an interdisciplinary team with colleagues from other faculties such as the Polytechnic and Fine Arts School.
To help students to produce news and to learn to prepare coverages every semester, there is a Workshop for news coverages at El Observador, which is coordinated by an active journalist and advised by professors who collaborate with the platform. This workshop is recognised with 1 ECTS credit.