The “Center of Youth Engagement Excellence” designation honors newspaper associations that have a deep, long-term commitment and that continue to devote resources to news literacy and youth engagement.

 "One of our core values is assuring that new generations understand the importance of free, credible and independent news, and are able to identify it, and seek it out, among the vast amount of information that bombards them each day," said Larry Kilman, Secretary General of WAN-IFRA.

 “The associations we honor have helped generations of young people and their teachers work together in support of these values. They are utterly committed to both quality education and to a free press as a foundation of democratic society," he said.

Receiving the designation were the national newspaper associations of the United States (Newspaper Association of America), Denmark (Danske Medier), Finland (Finnish Newspapers Association), Norway (Mediebedriftenes Landsforening), The Netherlands (NDP Nieuwsmedia), France,(SPQR, SPQN ARPEJ), Brazil (Associacão Nacional de Jornais), Germany (Bundesverband Deutscher Zeitungsverleger), Japan (Nihon Shinbun Kyokai), Colombia (Andiarios), Belgium (Les Journaux Francophone Belges), and Korea (Korean Association of Newspapers).

All have conducted youth engagement and newspapers in education programmes for at least two decades, and some of them much longer. Details of their work can be found at www.wan-ifra.org/node/44087

The induction ceremony took place during the Board meeting of WAN-IFRA in Amsterdam on the eve of the World Publishing Expo, the largest global trade exhibition for the news publishing and media industry. Details about the Expo can be found at http://www.worldpublishingexpo.com

More on WAN-IFRA’s programmes for youth engagement and news literacy can be found at http://www.wan-ifra.org/newsliteracy

WAN-IFRA, based in Paris, France, and Frankfurt, Germany, with subsidiaries in Singapore and India, is the global organisation of the world’s newspapers and news publishers. It represents more than 18,000 publications, 15,000 online sites and over 3,000 companies in more than 120 countries. Its core mission is to defend and promote press freedom, quality journalism and editorial integrity and the development of prosperous businesses.

Inquiries to: Dr. Aralynn McMane, Executive Director for youth engagement and news literacy, WAN-IFRA, 96 bis, rue Beaubourg, 75003 Paris France. Tel: +33 1 47 42 85 00. Fax: +33 1 42 78 92 33. E-mail: aralynn.mcmane@wan-ifra.org