FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASECONTACT: Amie Williams310-559-7065[email protected]
Under-served teenagers use digital journalism to inspire self-esteem and community activism
Newswise — CHICAGO, Ill., June 24, 2013 – Eleven young woman from as far away as South Africa and Morocco, along with girls from Chicago and Los Angeles will meet for the first time at the GlobalGirl Media (GGM) Summit, a five-day intensive training designed to help young women grow as journalists and innovative thinkers to create a more diverse public sphere, taking place from June 24-28, 2013 at DePaul University.
Through training centers in underserved areas of Soweto, South Africa, multiple cities in Morocco, Los Angeles, CA and Chicago, IL, GGM has been working with high school girls for more than three years, providing them with the training and experience needed to become multi-platform journalists. After working in their separate cities and nations for the past two years, the girls will have the opportunity to come together for the first time to share learnings and receive guidance from veteran female journalists lecturing and mentoring the students during the summit. Several international and Chicago-based journalists including award-winning journalist Michele Weldon; investigative reporter and editor Kristin Szremski; Norma Fay Green, Ph.D., professor and director of Graduate Journalism at Columbia College Chicago, among others, will work with the young women to provide professional expertise and real-world experiences on storytelling, blogging, videography, and citizen journalism.
“Stories create the history of the world and our goal is to help these young women become the storytellers of their lives and nations,” said GGM’s National Program Director, Tobie Loomis. “We are especially thrilled Chicago media will be supporting our efforts, with visiting female lecturers sharing their expertise with our girls.”
Among the participants, 20-year-old Annah Tseko from Soweto, South Africa and 19-year-old Maroi Ech-Charkaouy from Tetouan, Morocco will join 19-year-old Rocio Ortega from Los Angeles and other young women from GGM’s Chicago program to share and produce blogs, videos and news stories. Attendance at the Summit is another exciting opportunity for the girls from GGM’s Los Angeles training center reporter Imani Crenshaw recently won the National Association of Black Journalism’s Gannett Award on Innovation in Watchdog Journalism.
The event is being hosted by De Paul University’s Office of Public Relations and Communications and the College of Communication, and was made possible by The Harnisch Foundation in collaboration with The Op Ed Project, a non-profit group founded to increase the number of women thought leaders contributing to key commentary forums—which feed all other media, and drive thought leadership across all industries.
“Telling your own story and believing in your own voice is the beginning of being able to advocate for social change. GGM’s training programs have revealed a hunger for news reported from a girl’s perspective, especially in areas of the world that have traditionally marginalized the female voice. GGM provides solutions-based training to amplify that voice,” said Amie Williams, well-known filmmaker and co-founder of GGM.
About GlobalGirl Media (GGM)GlobalGirl Media (GGM) develops the authentic voice and media literacy of teenage girls and young women in under-served communities by teaching them to create and share digital journalism designed to ignite community activism and social change. Through mentoring, training and access to a worldwide network of online distribution partners, GlobalGirl Media harnesses the power of new digital media to empower young women to bring their often-overlooked perspectives onto the global media stage. GGM’s model is unique in that it pairs GGM news bureaus in U.S. cities with bureaus in international cities, creating a peer-to-peer global online network of girls. We stress new media over traditional news media, for example, leveraging broadband delivery (YouTube channels), social media, Facebook, Twitter, and Histogram to build community and critically assess existing news media.
FOR MORE INFORMATION OR TO INTERVIEW OUR GLOBALGIRL MEDIA JOURNALISTS PLEASE CONTACT: Tobie Loomis, National Programing Director, [email protected](310) 924-4050 [email protected]
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