Liz CapozziWe paid five teenagers to report on civic news for their peers. Here’s what we learned.
This summer, five student journalists took stories about Riviera Beach that they reported for Stet, such as the city’s new water plant and its Youth Council, and turned them into videos made for people their own age.
- They chose the stories and decided how to tell them, in their own voices.
Why it matters: Riviera Beach has deep civic energy but historically thin local coverage. Stet’s teen journalism program, Community Voices, trains and pays high school students from Inlet Grove High School in Riviera Beach to cover their own city. During the school break, we challenged those teens to reimagine reporting in a way that would appeal to their peers and make local news relevant.
Every student rebuilt a text story as a video, learning to script, shoot and edit along the way. The young journalists quickly learned to reframe a story for a new audience without losing what mattered. For some students, the question was what to keep, for others, what to cut.
What we learned: We were challenged by the natural rhythms of summer break; vacations, jobs and family obligations meant deadlines became fluid. Nonetheless, all five students turned text reporting into video, a transition none had made before. With guidance and editorial feedback, they quickly grasped such skills as scripting and framing the story for a different audience.
The bigger takeaway showed us something worth exploring: that student-made video could help Stet fill a gap in our news coverage.
What’s next: We’re working with the students on how video fits for Community Voices — and Stet — in the future.
As we kick off our second year of Community Voices, we’re more committed than ever to bringing young people into news coverage.
Watch their work: Watch the videos here. Please comment and share!
— Liz Capozzi and C.B. Hanif
