DEADLINE: Freelancer Hostile Environment Training

Event Date: 
April 3, 2017

The Pulitzer Center, in collaboration with The New York Times and A Culture of Safety Alliance (ACOS), is pleased to announce that we will cover the costs of industry-approved Hostile Environment/First Aid Training (HEFAT) courses for up to 31 freelance journalists working anywhere in the world.

A choice of two courses will be available. The Pulitzer Center and The Times will fund the costs of tuition, course materials, accommodations, food and non-alcoholic beverages for the duration of the course for the selected applicants.

The first course, which will be conducted by Blue Mountain Group at their training facility in Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley, will be open to as many as 15 freelancers selected from among registered attendees at the Pulitzer Center’s June 3-4 Gender Lens Conference in Washington, D.C. Bus transportation from Washington to Blue Mountain’s Lehigh Valley training site and back will be provided. The course will run from June 5-8. Freelance journalists selected for this course will also be provided with lodging for two nights in Washington.

The second course, for up to 16 candidates, will be conducted by Hawthorne Proactive at its training facility in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The Hawthorne training course runs for six days, August 13-18. Applicants are responsible for their own travel to and from Belfast.

The Pulitzer Center and ACOS will provide assistance toward the cost of transport for a limited number of applicants who can demonstrate a clear financial need. All applicants for the training opportunity will be responsible for obtaining required travel visas.

Hawthorne Proactive is a security firm that runs courses for journalists operating in difficult areas of the world. The company worked with Thomson Reuters and the Pulitzer Center on a similar training opportunity in 2015. Hawthorne's instructors have extensive operational experience in places like Colombia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya and Syria.

Blue Mountain Group, which is also based in the UK, has a track record of providing high quality HEFAT training to journalists from numerous media outlets, including The New York Times.

Applications should be submitted using the Hostile Environment Training webform. The deadline for submissions is April 3, 2017.

Journalists selected for the training will be notified by April 17.

 

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