Aghyad Abu Zaid : Human Interest Story
Aghyad is one of the millions of Syrians who fled Syria upon the eruption of the Syrian conflict in 2013. Story of his path to become a journalist.
He started his refuge journey in 2013 by fleeing to Egypt, then Jordan, searching for the basic elements for survival. Although he studied Physics at the University of Jerash, his passion for media and journalism has never left his heart. Aghyad has had the stamina and the aspiration to shift his passion towards media from a hobby into a professional career.
His passion started when he was still in Syria and emerged to the surface when he started covering and publishing the events of the conflict through social media, mainly Facebook. The difficult situation back then, encouraged him to utilize whatever means existed to provide people with information about the conflict events in Syria.
To fulfil his dream to become a professional media expert
Although he became a refugee, he was persistent to fulfill his dream of becoming a professional media expert. He attended many journalism trainings and continues to search for opportunities to strengthen his skills. His professional career commenced in 2014 when he started working as a reporter for "Syrians among Us" program at Radio Al Ballad. He became as a news anchor and evolved to become the project coordinator since 2019.
During his constant pursuit for growth, he attended a training with CFI in Irbid, titled as: “Covering Refugees News Through Storytelling Approach”. The training was organized by Qudra2 project in September 2021 and was attended by 18 journalists (8 Syrians and 10 Jordanians). The core objectives of the training were to train journalists on using proper terminology while producing a story, and to produce stories in various formats such as podcasts, videos and written articles. It also trained the journalists on producing accurate stories that are free of hate speech. “This training enriched my knowledge and increased my skills as a journalist”, said Aghyad. Furthermore, this training allowed him to create business connections with other journalists as one of its major outcomes: “I started collaborating with Jordanian journalists, and we had several work meetings together. These work meetings led to new work opportunities to emerge in the horizon”, explains Aghyad.
The relentless quest for professional career growth, peer encouragements, available training opportunities and the easy integration with the Jordanian community allowed Aghyad to evolve in his career. He is working now as news presenter at Radio Al Ballad. “Endless pursuit for transforming passion into professionalism, determination and hard work will allow you to reap the fruits of what you sow.” Said Aghyad. He indicated that he will put forth extensive personal efforts, engage in more professional trainings to reach his aspiration in becoming a renowned TV presenter.
The workshop was organized within the framework of the Qudra 2 program a regional action co-financed by the EU Regional Trust Fund in Response to the Syrian Crisis, the EU Madad Fund, the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and Spanish Agency or International Development Cooperation (AECID).