BG MIL Conference 2024: Mapping MIL initiatives in Bulgaria

The world has become very complex, and media literacy should be recognised as a basic competence. With these words, Deputy Education Minister Natalia Miteva opened the annual media literacy conference organised by the Bulgarian Media Literacy Coalition.

The conference was titled "Media Literacy: sustainability, expressiveness, solutions" and was held for the sixth time in partnership with the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom. This year it was joined by the educational platform "Knigovishte", the children's online media "ВИЖ" and the Slovenian children's media Časoris. The initiative Преподаваме was also presented.

The highlight of the first part of the conference was the presentation of the interactive map of media literacy in Bulgaria, prepared by a team of the coalition. The idea for such a map is old, but the implementation has always been a challenge.
The event provided a platform for exchange of experience and good examples between teachers and experts in media literacy from Bulgaria and abroad - from Slovenia, Romania, France, Hungary.

A very interesting discussion about the goals of media literacy, moderated by Aralynn Abare McMane, Global Youth and News Media (France), was made by Numi Everling-Beke, Idea Foundation (Hungary), Nicoletta Fotiade, Mediawise Society (Romania), Sonja Merljak Zdvoč, Časoris (Slovenia) and Petya Koseva, teacher at"Bulgarian School", who inspired the room with their experience and knowledge.

In the second part of the event, participants could choose between moderated workshops with representatives from different sectors of education or workshops presenting resources for teaching media literacy.

Representatives of the Bulgarian-Romanian Digital Media Observatory (BROD) participated in the event, and the work of the Hub was repeatedly commented on and exemplified by participants, demonstrating the relevance of BROD in the Bulgarian environment.