A special war edition of the West Riding Post has been launched online, featuring reports on the conflict written by trainees on the Postgraduate Diploma in Print Journalism at the Centre for Journalism, Trinity & All Saints, Leeds.

Just eight weeks into their ten-month course, the trainees have been out and about in Yorkshire reporting on reaction to the conflict in Iraq. The online paper, produced by the college, also includes links to relevant websites.

Their articles have covered news from when schoolchildren came out of lessons in protest at the prospect of war, through to the road traffic chaos when protesters took to the streets during the rush-hour when the bombing began.

Local authorities and other institutions have been interviewed about their contingency plans and there has been coverage on local angles, such as casualties from the area or from local regiments, as well as the ongoing political storm on whether the war should take place at all.

Centre for Journalism senior lecturer Tony Harcup said: "Alongside their law, shorthand, public affairs and everything else we expect our journalism trainees to report on real stories from day one of the course.

"That means they have been reporting on anti-war protests, how local MPs voted, local casualties and so on. They'll be producing their own weekly paper later in the course but we thought it would be a good idea to give some of their stories a public airing now by producing a special online edition of the paper dealing with the war.

"It's all part of taking journalism training out of the classroom into the real world."

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