In 2014, the Council of Europe completed a co-operation project in Azerbaijan divided in two phases. Funded by a voluntary contribution of Norway, the overarching goal of this project was to improve the standards of education for journalism students in Azerbaijan, thereby contributing to the development of a media sector capable of meeting key democratic challenges.

BBC Media Action (formerly known as the BBC World Service Trust) was the implementing partner of the project.

• Phase I of the project (1 March 2009 – 15 February 2011) set out to achieve to promote practice-based journalism teaching in line with the Bologna requirements, improve the pedagogical and journalistic skills of university lecturers, and devise a modular curriculum which responds to the real needs of the media industry at Baku Slavic University. Thanks to the project, Baku Slavic University has been implementing since 2010 a new modular curriculum which meets the challenges of the new media environment by introducing courses as New Media, Photojournalism and Children’s rights.
• Phase 2 of the project (1 December 2012 – 31 May 2014) has been working on improving the curriculum of the Baku State University, which is the largest university in the country. The specific objective for Baku State University was to bring TV and Radio journalism teaching in line with modern teaching practices and develop a new subject – Photojournalism.