Adobe Youth Voices

In June 2006, WKCD joined other U.S.-based youth media organizations in a multi-year international initiative called “Adobe Youth Voices,” sponsored by Adobe Systems. In the first year, we have teamed with youth and educators in New York City, San Francisco and San Jose, Seattle, London, Delhi, and Bangalore to produce a rich array of multimedia and book publishing projects. Here we share work in progress and final products from this collaboration.

Global Youth Voices

In 2005, WKCD began to work with youth outside the U.S. on a range of projects, most involving photography and narrative. We began in Tanzania, in East Africa. By the end of 2008, we will have worked with youth along the Burma-Bangladesh border; in Beijing and London; in Bangalore, New Delhi, and Noida, India; and across the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania. Here we present a directory of what has come, to date, from WKCD’s global youth voices: websites, multimedia dictionaries, audio slide shows, and feature stories.

Voices from the Middle Grades

What do students in the middle grades most need from their   teachers? WKCD offers their answers in a sequel to our groundbreaking book Fires in the Bathroom—this time, listening to the voices of early adolescents. Here we share what middle schoolers have to say about topics like forming identities, the impact of grades, what’s fair, school lunch.

Student Research for Action

From 2003 – 2006, WKCD provided competitive grants to high school students nationwide, working with teachers and other adults, to put their minds to solving important school and community issues. With support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, WKCD distributed $200,000 in funds to  52 schools in 17 states through its Student Research for Action initiative.

This website provides a rich archive of this initiative, including one of the largest collections of student work available online. In a time of heightened educational accountability, Student Research for Action sends several critical messages: that complex problem solving, independent judgment, and teamwork among students and teachers merit a place in every high school's curriculum; that what happens inside a school's walls should connect to the world outside; that young people have the capacity to reflect, analyze, and create new knowledge with public benefit.

Students as Allies in School Reform

What if teachers and students became steady allies rather than frequent adversaries in their daily classroom encounters? What would it take for students to become stakeholders not just in their own success but also in that of their teachers and schools? With support from MetLIfe Foundation, WKCD explored these questions with student research teams and educators in Chicago, Houston, Oakland, Philadelphia, and St. Louis. Students surveyed classmates and teachers, presented their findings at public forums, and shaped recommendations for change.

Students Learning in Small Schools: An Online Portfolio

In 2003 WKCD, with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, compiled a comprehensive digital portfolio to capture teaching and student learning in four small schools: Minnesota New Country School (Henderson, MN), The Met School (Providence, RI), Urban Academy (New York City), and High Tech High (San Diego, CA). The portfolio is filled with teacher assignments and student work, along with an array of documents and protocols that give these schools their structure and thrust.

Inside Out: How a School Turns Itself Around

Good, bad, or average—everyone knows a school's reputation. It builds up over time and then sticks like glue to the students and teachers who go there. But that verdict can be unfair.

Look at a school with a good reputation and you see a tradition of winning. Its students come from neighborhoods and families with more money. Its facilities are well maintained. It offers plenty of Advanced Placement courses. Almost nobody ever drops out, and almost everybody goes on to college. At schools with bad reputations, it's the opposite. Everywhere you look, you see the signs of poverty. Grates cover the windows, the textbooks are old, and you don't find many trophy cases. More kids drop out than go to college.

Starting in the winter of 2005, students at Providence’s Central High School, long considered the “worst” school in the city, began an online journal with WKCD called “Inside Out.” The goal was simple: to give the community—inside and outside the school—a better appreciation of how Central is changing.