The annual Eurovision Children & Youth Experts and the Youth News Exchange meetings were hosted by the EBU's Hungarian Member MTV in Budapest (25 to 27 November).

Youth News Exchange

The annual meeting of the Youth News Exchange was over two days (25 to 26 November) with delegates from all over Europe. The first special session “Can we always tell the truth?” focused on two difficult topics: the refugee crisis and terrorism. Participants exchanged views, know-how and best practices on how politically correct they need to be when reporting on these difficult news to their children’s audience. The second special session was dedicated to the future of children’s news. After an inspiring presentation by Maurice Wheeler, the delegates were split into groups to prepare a 5’ pitch on how news programmes will look in 5 years’ time.

More than 50 news items were presented during these two days. The YNE Trophy for the most creative, innovative, informative, bravest or strongest news item of the year was awarded to Jochem Nühn, editor-in-chief of the NOS-NTR Zapp Weekjournaal, for his portrait of Amal, a Syrian girl.

The YNE Bureau was re-elected for a two-year term: Chairman: Markus Mörchen (ZDF logo!), Tommy Zwicky (DR Ultra Nyt) and Ronald Bartlema (NOS Jeugdjournaal). 

Children's Drama & Documentary Series 

The screening sessions for the children’s drama and documentary series 2015 on 26 November featured 17 high-quality films for children aged 6 to 12. These series allow participating members to broadcast tailor-made content from 12 different countries in Europe and Asia.

Children & Youth Experts meeting

The plenary session of the Children & Youth Experts was held on 27 November. A total of 45 delegates from 22 different EBU Members attended the meeting, which focused on how children are actually in control of content nowadays. Three speakers contributed to the agenda. Dr Jacqueline Harding opened the day with the keynote speech “Changing platforms and changing lives”. Maurice Wheeler explained “How, where and why children engage with content in a digital world”. Then Andrew Brenner moderated the workshop on writing for the under-7s.