MIT-NBC Journalism Competition at Reading Public Library
For the past 3 weeks, I’ve been working on an exciting project that came to Reading Public Library around about the beginning of July. Figures I’d be writing about it just as it’s going to end, but better late than never!
My friend Jason Haas, who is working with The Education Arcade over at MIT, approached me about possibly bringing a project to the library involving teens generating news content for sharing online. It sounded promising and exciting, although the timeline was going to be really tight: the initial meeting with Jason, Scot Osterweil, our director Ruth and my supervisor Lorraine was on June 28, and the program start date was set for July 16, the height of summer reading program season.
But the project was just too exciting to pass up, so we went for it. The goal was for each teen, or group of teens, to produce a local news story that had a national context, as well. The competition was limited to teens who live or go to school in Reading, going into 9th grade through 12th grade, but the content type for submissions was wide open: photo essays, podcasts, videos, articles, you name it. If it could be shared on the web, it was an eligible format. In partnership with NBC, MIT would provide resources such as hardware, mentorship, and anything else the competitors needed. They also arranged for office hours as well as workshops with Kathy Abbot, a producer at NBC in NYC. Every teen who submitted an entry received a $25 iTunes gift card, and the grand prize (which will be announced on Monday, August 13) is a trip to 30 Rock to see the NBC studios and meet NBC staff.
For serious, kids. And it was just Reading, MA.
We knew it might be tough to bring in kids during the summer without the help of school, so the media blitz began as soon as possible. The initial press release went out the week before the program started, and was published in the local papers, as well as the July 12 issue of the library’s Off The Shelf newsletter (scroll down to see the “What’s Your Story?” article) and via the high school student and parent email list, with their permission. We also posted flyers at all of the local teen hangouts, and a slide version of the flyer on the local cable channel bulletin board, not to mention tons of word of mouth marketing. I even sent out a special message to the Netguides.
Our efforts were well rewarded: 30 people attended the information session on July 16, and 13 kids signed up on the spot, which was more than we anticipated. Several more students signed up after the general meeting, which took sign-ups to 18.
After that first meeting, the program really took off. The schedule and communication guidelines were firmed up and published in the July 19 issue of Off The Shelf (scroll down to the “Report It Now! Mit-Nbc Journalism Competition - Sign Up By Monday, July 23″ article), and everyone participating in the competition was added to a secret Facebook group (it sounds more mystical than it is, it was really to protect the privacy of the minors in the group), which was used as the online home base for the competition. The NBC staff interacted with the kids in Facebook, as well as through the meetings at the library, one of which was actually facilitated via iChat, since the producer wasn’t able to make it because of official producer business. Topics ranged from obesity and eating disorders to Habitat for Humanity projects and much more. It was impressive to see how seriously the kids took the project, but also to see how much fun they were having creating their news.
For the most part, the kids who produced video were able to film with their own video cameras and edit with either iMovie or Windows Movie Maker, nothing more sophisticated was required. Truthfully, those are the tools the teens use for their school projects, so it wasn’t a huge learning curve for them. What really seemed to be most helpful were the office hours, the meetings with the producer, and the Q&A on the Facebook group.
The projects were due in this past Monday, August 6, at 6pm, at which point there were 7 submissions from 10 participants (there were several groups and several individual projects). We’re currently in the judging phase, where the MIT and NBC crews are reviewing the projects. On Monday, August 13, someone from NBC will be here to present the winners, and we’ll get to view and talk about the projects. I’m hoping to make it a public viewing, but as with many a quick-lined project, we’re still working on that part. 
Tags: work
