The project started in February 2007, aiming to increase the number of skilled female journalists in Bangladesh. During the project period, eighty female graduates were selected for six-month skilldevelopment training programme. Twenty female journalists, working from port city of Chittagoang (second largest city of the country) received weeklong training on reporting skills. The project turned out successful when two third of the trained fellows took journalism as their profession. Bea ten Tusscher, Ambassador of the Netherlands to Bangladesh and former USA Ambassador to Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Lauren Kaheaokekai Moriarty visited News Network to meet the fellows to encouTusscher, Ambassador of the Netherlands to Bangladesh and former USA Ambassador to Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Lauren Kaheaokekai Moriarty visited News Network to meet the fellows to encourage them and appreciated News Network for its activities. Bea ten Tusscher visited the News Network office on 19 August 2008 and distributed certificates among a group of fellows who completed a six-month training programme on practical journalism. While Ambassador Lauren Kaheaokekai Moriarty visited the News Network office on 13 November 2008 and took part in an experience-sharing meeting with the fellows. Victor Joseph, the then Regional Officer Asia of Free Voice, came to Dhaka in June 2008 to observe the progress of the project. He talked to the fellows, whom were either receiving training or had already completed their course and were working in different media houses. Fellows prepared more than two hundred news features/in-depth reports and most of those items were released to the print media, and published with due credit. Books compiled of their items were published in both the languages Bangle and English.