Description

The Educational Video Centers offer children from different backgrounds the opportunity to express themselves through video and documentary making.

Transcript

Learning at Educational Video Centers Host: Seventeen-year-old Darrell Williams lives in Harlem, one of New York cities toughest neighborhoods. Unlike many of his school friends, he stayed away from the drugs and gangs so prevalent in the area. Darrel Williams: Hey everybody! What’s up guys? Host: Home is a one bedroom flat, which he shares with his mother, sister and two younger brothers. Darrel Williams: I can’t live here. I refused to stay in this neighborhood, I mean the sooner I can get out of here and get them out I mean. And my mothers like inferno apartment because this is too small and I told her, “If you can’t do that, then let’s just get out of here completely. The time is spaced out.” Host: As part of his high school diploma, Darrell is taking a course at the city’s Educational Video Center, the documentary workshop of a student the chance to use television to express themselves. Female: So, be creative, you know with your material and don’t feel constrained but also get the basics. Host: Joan Jubela’s group of seven students from different high schools is working on a documentary on role models. It’s a steep learning curve but it’s up to them to master the technical and editorial skills they will need to complete the project. Joan Jubela: The point of the course is to get student to realize that they have a voice. So, they can utilize that voice through video. They’re from poor neighborhoods. That doesn’t mean that they are not bright and intelligent but they have a lot of obstacles that they have to overcome. Host: Unlike professional TV crews, they have to travel to their chosen location on the subway. Female: Getting close, don’t worry about introducing just go to questions. It’s like easy questions, out of the shot keeping it close so that you will block the wind. Female: Okay, I’m blocking the wind. Host: Today they are planning to works as student of the Martin Luther King High School about their role models. Seventeen-year-old Cindy Lingiad was born and raised in Brooklyn. Like many of the other students, she is realizing that interviewing is not just easy as it looks on TV. Cindy: Well, a lot of people are - they tend to say the same on what they are saying but I mean they are going okay. I just have to pull some answer out of people by just going all right. I’m learning. Host: Thirty minutes later, the students are asked to leave the premises by the school security guards. Darrel Williams: So, I’m trying to think of how it’s supposed to look and what I want and I also told him, “You know, get some of those chaps that throng us so we can also incorporate into the shooting about how the defenses of people thinking and stuff like and how they do not want us there.” Female: This is really the first time now and usually we’re going to see a lot of mistakes. So, they are learning to interview, learning to work together, learning to use the equipment and really, that’s what we’re doing today. Host: Twenty five-year-old Melissa Bracket from the Bronx did the same course eight years ago. The experienced help her land a job at New York One, the city’s 24-hour TV news channel. Melissa: I knew how to shoot. I knew how to edit. I knew how to produce a video documentary. How many 17-year-olds can say that? And I’m sure I used that on my resume to get a job here at New York One. Female: So, why do you think that most people are tends to look to the media for role model? Host: Just back in the classroom, Darrell and Cindy started editing their material. Cindy: Well, I do not want to see that guy getting out of that cab. I mean it’s not -- Darrell: I mean neither but… Host: It’s at this stage that they learn the price of technical problems, bubbly camera work and missed questions in the field. Melissa: I think one thing that we do is that we make students realized that they have the power to express their opinions and make a mark, both in the culture and in society that young people have a voice and that there’s an audience that wants to hear that voice. Host: Like his classmates, there are all hopes the cause will be a springboard into a career that will get him out of the inner city for good. Darrell: I can have an education usually can’t portray the intelligent person and your voice won’t be heard because they going to say, “It’s okay.” I’m just one of those guys. And I have to be able to stand through and show people that I know what I’m talking about. And wherever I go, I want to live on my cap. I want to be able to keep going higher and higher and never stop.