Weekly Media Roundup: May 18, 2016

Students Jump into Club (Norwich Bulletin, Connecticut)

Earlier this year, Sterling Community School students were treated to a visit from a jump-rope expert who inspired them to start their own afterschool jump-rope program. The students have done all the work to make the club a reality – they put together a proposal, made flyers, created permission slips and developed a schedule. Principal Shari Ternowchek said the club is a great way for students to stay healthy and build a sense of camaraderie. “It really opened the doors to the quiet, shy kids,” she told the Norwich Bulletin.

NYC Teens Head to Flint to Bring Relief to Water Crisis (Newsday, New York)

When New York City students in the YMCA’s afterschool program learned about the Flint water crisis, they decided to hold a water drive that would eventually collect 300 bottles of water and donations for filters. But for six teens, that wasn’t enough – they personally made the trek to Michigan to deliver the donations themselves. Sixteen-year-old Fahme Ibrahim’s family struggled without water after Superstorm Sandy, so he said he could relate to Flint residents as they deal with their contaminated water supply. “Knowing that Flint was out of water for a longer period of time, it was unimaginable,” he told Newsday. “I wanted to make sure we could give back.”

Future Docs Go to Cooking Class (Philadelphia Inquirer, Pennsylvania)

Medical students from Rutgers’ Robert Wood Johnson Medical School are trying to mitigate diseases like obesity and diabetes by bringing their medical knowledge to an afterschool cooking class in New Brunswick. RWJ encourages its students to participate in community service, and after seeing the role food choices play in many of these diseases, three students – Sally Vitez, Jaclyn Portelli Tremont and Melissa Villars – decided this was the best way they could start to treat the next generation. “With the epidemic of childhood obesity in this country, we felt an obligation, as future physicians, to try and teach kids how much the food they eat is directly related to their health,” Vitez told the Philadelphia Inquirer. The class gives students lessons in moderation and a plethora of healthy recipes to try at home.

Refuge for Refugees (Tucson Weekly, Arizona)

For two hours every Wednesday, documentary filmmaker Özlem Ayse Özgür teaches filmmaking techniques to refugee teenagers as part of the Owl and Panther Youth Film Project. The art therapy program hopes to give these students a set of valuable multimedia skills while building a community of friends and mentors for teens who may feel out of place in their new country. Over the course of the four-month program, each student creates a short self-portrait as well as a longer film about the meaning of “home.” Owl and Panther administrative manager Abby Hungwe said the program has helped students build their confidence and take on leadership roles. “I think with any work that you do with kids, the reward is seeing their growth and seeing them push through something that may have begun as a weakness and converting that into a success,” she told Tucson Weekly.