Inquirer Volunteers receive training in news writing, multimedia and digital verification at the INQUIRER.net office in Makati City on Saturday, Feb. 1, to gear them up to contribute to the organization’s special coverage of the May 2025 national and local elections. INQUIRER.net / ARNEL TACSON
MANILA, Philippines — A new batch of dynamic and budding journalists is all set to contribute to INQUIRER.net’s special coverage of the May 2025 national and local elections through its newly relaunched volunteer program.
The volunteers were welcomed at the INQUIRER.net office in Makati City, where they received training in news writing, multimedia and digital verification on Saturday, Feb. 1.
They will be expected to pitch and write stories as well as to post photos and videos for INQUIRER.net in its coverage of the midterm polls.
The program onboarded volunteers from higher education institutions across Metro Manila, Cavite, Laguna and Rizal, who have had experience in their respective college and university publications as well as internships at other newsrooms.
Among the reasons they cited for signing up were to experience covering elections in a professional media organization, serve the public and to fight election-related disinformation.
INQUIRER.net Editor-in-Chief Abel Ulanday oriented the volunteers on the organization’s editorial standards, while Chief Operating Officer Imee Alcantara gave an inspiring message, looking forward to their contributions in covering the elections with fairness.
Celine Samson, head of online verification at Vera Files, led a session on digital verification and fact-checking on behalf of the Asian American Journalists Association.
The initiative began in 2016 as the Inquirer Volunteer Corps, an effort in collaboration with schools, organizations and communities to empower students and citizens to tell their stories on INQUIRER.net.
READ: INQUIRER.net launches volunteer program for 2022 election coverage
It was relaunched in 2021 as Inquirer Volunteers, involving registered voters to cover the first national and local elections since the COVID-19 pandemic.
INQUIRER.net revived the program in 2024 to involve the youth in an election campaign primarily taking place in the digital realm.
For interested volunteers, kindly sign up and submit a copy of your résumé and portfolio here.
Follow @INQVolunteers on Twitter for more updates.