Meet Kirkcaldy’s new community reporter

Darren Gibb is one of 82 Community News Reporters appointed to selected newsrooms across the industry.

The aim is to connect with under-represented communities whose news, and activities, often goes un-reported.

The project is funded by Facebook in partnership with regional news publishers, including JPI Media – which publishes the Fife Free Press – and the National Council for the Training of Journalists.

Recognising that its platform is now one of the major ways that people access news, Facebook, which is providing a £4.5 million fund for the scheme, said it wanted to do more to support local publishers.

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The Press was included in the project along with our sister paper, the Edinburgh Evening News.

Darren’s remit is to focus on the groups and individuals in Kirkcaldy and Dysart whose work people don’t hear about.

He has already met with a number of groups and launched a new ‘Kirkcaldy Connected’ page on Facebook. It has already grown to over 200 members.

Darren (36), from Ladybank, who is married with an eight-year-old daughter, is a former pupil of Bell Baxter High School in Cupar. He had previously worked with Fife Council for the last 13 years as a recycling centre assistant before returning to full time education last September.

Darren enrolled into the HNC Practical Journalism course at Fife College’s St Brycedale Campus in Kirkcaldy, where he learned the essential journalism skills that he will be using in the newsroom.

Darren said: “I have always wanted to have a career in journalism, and last year I was able to go back into education to realise my dream.

“I have worked extremely hard to get where I am now, and I feel very lucky to have been offered the community reporter position with the Fife Free Press.”

He added: “I have always felt that local press plays an important part in our communities, there are so many people in the Kirkcaldy area whose voices are not being heard. In my role I can give these people a voice in some of the most under-served areas in Fife.”