News
FSM Youth Take on the Dropout Crisis
October 15, 2011
Kelsey Grayer in "I Want to Stay in School"
Montel Williams in "See Yourself in a Different Light"
Free Spirit Media is partnering with WTTW11, the PBS NewsHour, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting on a national initiative titled American Graduate: Let’s Make it Happen. The initiative, supported by the America’s Promise Alliance, seeks to raise public awareness and engagement to combat the nation’s high school dropout crisis. Serving a teenage population, this initiative is extremely important to FSM. The nation’s drop out rate is around 30%, while it is nearly 45% in Chicago.
Free Spirit Media’s role in the campaign includes the development and production of a series of youth-produced public service announcements aimed at encouraging teens to stay in school and graduate. FSM’s young people hope the videos they produce will resonate on a peer-to-peer level and spark motivation for young people at risk for dropping out to stay in school. Additionally, students in Free Spirit Media’s journalism programs are producing a series of news stories on the crisis for a national audience, as part of the PBS NewsHour Student Reporting Labs project.
This past summer, a crew of eight juniors and seniors worked with FSM Productions, our social enterprise initiative where our most advanced young media makers develop professional skills as they work on commissioned media products, to produce two public service announcements for the campaign. One PSA illustrates the turning point for one young man choosing between returning to school or engaging in a world of negative behaviors. The other features a diverse group of students talking about what subjects inspire them to stay in school. You can see these PSAs here.
