text/photo by Bobo Wei
editing by Valerie Cooper

The Data & News Society is celebrating its second year and coming back for a new season. The Season 2.1 Colloquium was held on 21st September, with Florin C. Serban and Valerie Cooper, PhD students in the School of Communication at Hong Kong Baptist University, as speakers.

Mr. Serban comes from Romania and earlier this year was a visiting researcher at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. Ms. Cooper comes from the USA and over the summer attended media and communication conferences in Europe. Both shared their experiences in Europe and North America with participants.

The technological developments and prominence of big data are constantly increasing, making it a challenge for even journalism professors and instructors to stay on the cutting edge. Mr. Serban addressed some of these challenges in teaching theoretical and practical aspects of technology and data journalism, as witnessed by the speaker during his tenure as a visiting researcher at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. He spoke about  the difficulties of introducing ever-evolving new media technologies and data working tools to undergraduates, as well as new tools he learned from both professors and students.

Ms. Cooper’s talk focused on data journalism tools and organisations developing in Europe, and how these can be useful to journalists around the world. Specifically, she spoke about news outlets developing creative ways to use data journalism in the United Kingdom, where she previously lived earned her master’s degree in media and development.