In this major program of one semester, students will explore the power and limitations of involving audience in a variety of ways in their journalistic work. They work for a media partner in this major. For this they form editorial groups of five students. During all phases of their journalistic work, they need to experiment with reaching out to, and involving their audience in the journalistic process.

By this we mean: consulting the audience about topics, angles, research questions, narrative forms, platforms to be used. They can do this indirectly through their own observation via following and filtering public statements on, for example, social media platforms. But more importantly this ‘consulting’ can be done by coming into direct contact with the audience of their media partner, for example by asking questions by physically looking them up and start a conversation, but also through surveys, target group interviews, crowdsourcing, polls or calls on social media. This can also be done, for example, by following and/or actively facilitating the public debate in social media groups, organising meetings for your audience, or literally visiting for a ‘kitchen table’ conversation or ‘meet-ups’ with a mixed group of involved people. They are allowed to go as far as organising events, exhibitions or even performing a play or develop a small game.

Not that they should apply all that is mentioned here. The students will of course decide, together with their editor, and depending on the intended target group which forms and techniques they will use or experiment with. We challenge them to explore the boundaries of what can still be considered journalism. And at the end of the course they will need to form their own opinion on what the power and limitations of audience engagement is and whether this is a kind of journalism they want to pursue in their professional career.