21k12

Kate Meenan-Waugh opens her presentation by proudly telling us about international learning at Washington International School, but also saying that they need to keep developing new programs.   She hands off to a journalism teacher from WIS, who tells us that it is unlike most student newspapers by being an global newspaper, called “the international dateline.”    

The paper has traditionally been published only in a print-version, which has its drawbacks, he explains– lack of timeliness, burden of typsesetting, waste of paper, lack of breadth of media tools such as video and audio.    But there is a new alternative: 

Lack of feedback, too, is a limitation for print pru; we should make it easier for journalism readers to give feedback promptly, and provide greater accountability to writers who must answer to their readers this way.   AND, print version publishing limits audience to the campus only, when our students are writing articles that are meaningful to the wider world.   I love this– I think on-line publishing ought to be a huge tool for enhancing the significance of student work, and motivating them to make it better. 

The solution: an online journal, which they are calling Student News Action Network.  I love this, it is so cool and so 21st century– students collaborating on-line to attack real issues, write about them and publish them for real audiences.    I would  love my students at St. Gregory to find a way to involve themselves in this; it is great stuff.  

The presentation has been good, but I kind of feel short-changed; I wish we had had more time about SNAN, and how it works– we took too long getting to this, too much preamble and not enough about the heart of this great new news network for our students.