Radio Rootz is an in-school and afterschool program that involves youth in building the skills to produce media about topics currently missing from the news. We do so through project-driven, youth-led courses that make current issues relevant to their lives. Along the way, our youth bolster their skills as technically-savvy and critical media makers, as advocates and community organizers, and as citizens actively involved in creating their future. Broadcast over the airwaves, seen on tv, and placed in prominent cultural venues, our youth impact a wide audience with unique and insightful stories.
Through the youth leadership training course the most promising graduates deepen their knowledge while learning to be mentors for the paid youth summer program.
During the summer program, Rootz youth pair with young people from community-based organizations to create socially relevant documentaries. These partnerships have produced documentaries on issues ranging from alternatives to zero-tolerance school policies to religious hate crimes against Muslim youth to the Khmer Rouge tribunal in Cambodia.
Examples of our youth-produced work include:
- A five minute video about the drop out crisis produced in partnership with PBS Newshour.
- A radio interview with Michelle Rhee, the former School Chancellor in the District of Columbia, about the decrease in guidance counselors for students enrolled in public high schools. This piece was aired on Free Speech Radio News, a nationally syndicated news outlet.
- “Superheroes of East Harlem”, an audio portrait series featuring Harlem-based community members. This series was showcased in a culminating event in association with El Museo del Barrio, a museum located in East Harlem.
- A radio story produced in 2001 for the BBC by 8th grader Carlton Tayler.
