Samya Ayish is an independent journalist, a media trainer and a digital storyteller. She was the first teaching fellow with the Google News Initiative in the Middle East and North Africa. Before joining Google, Ayish worked as an online video and social media producer at CNN in Dubai, covering entertainment and cinema, and specializing in the Arab film industry. She produced one season of the podcast “Scene Cinema,” which focuses on independent Arab Cinema. She hosted a bi-monthly show on CNNArabic, “Poster,” which also focuses on independent Arab cinema. Ayish focuses on visual storytelling in her work, creating ways to promote news stories across different digital platforms. In her training, she focuses on teaching journalists innovative ways to cover news, tell stories and distribute their productions across different platforms. Ayish is also a children’s book author and she leads an initiative called “Samya Reads.”