VideoProduction

Video Production, Schools, And Courses From A Distance

The idea that courses in video production would become a fixture of modern public education never occurred to me when I started exploring its uses as a methodology, but all indications are that some type of video production is finding its way into every system, if not every school, in the country. On one website with the goal of selling a youth-focused television channel (www.myvtv.com), youth produced videos from schools across North America are displayed. The representative from the station I spoke with (Rod Allan, personal communication, May 29, 2003) would provide details because the information is “proprietary,” but he confirmed that more than 1000 schools were participating. Many schools with the technical resources have developed their own websites, and festivals, contests, and school viewings are additional outlets for bringing student work to the world beyond the classroom. Many other institutions, such as the YMCA and Paper Tiger Television (organizations with extremely different purposes), reach out to youth outside of school.

Discovering just how far-reaching the proliferation of video production courses is beyond the scope of this project, but another indication is the existence of at least five organizations in the United States seeking to further it. These five are: the American Film Institute, City Voices, City Visions of SUNY Buffalo (CVCV), the Digital Studio of the UCR/California Museum of Photography, the Educational Video Center of New York City (EVC), and Workforce LA of Los Angeles. All seek in some way to bring video production to secondary schools.

The rational for promoting video varies. The American Film Institute is explicit only about the motivating influence of video production (American Film Institute, n.d.a, b), and student motivation is probably the most common reason for promoting video, being implicit in many other reasons. Concerns about student motivation is behind two of the ideals central to Workforce LA’s program, described as a triangle of “personal engagement, real world relevance, and principles and standards” (J. Perry, personal communication, May 29, 2003). Personal engagement and real world relevance are two sides of what is inspiring about video and a part of what is missing in school for many adolescents.

Personal involvement by students necessitates making what is personal to students an acceptable and welcome part of school. Goodman, of EVC, describes “a profound disconnect” between students and their schools, which is “the failure of schools and after-school programs to address the media as the predominant language of youth today, or to recognize the social and cultural contexts in which students live” (2003, p. 2). This, he argues, should lead us to making student worlds part of the school world. Some progress is possible by simply having students create something they commonly spend quantities of recreational time consuming. Personal involvement also comes with inviting issues of real concern into the classroom. Goodman quotes one teacher who reflects on the effects of such a project, “‘Because of the seriousness of the topic, [one student] had to be thoughtful. . . . He connected that with his own self-identity, as a hard worker and as a competent student’” (p. 91). Thus personal involvement reflects the potential of video to engage the self, which can extend to other classes while it motivates intrinsically.

Real world relevance, on the other hand, motivates extrinsically, and it can arise in at least two activities. The acquisition of marketable skills is stressed in vocational preparation. Workforce LA is not explicitly trying to prepare students for careers in media production, but it is funded by several companies in the entertainment industry (Workforce LA, n.d.a, b), suggesting a potential desire on the industry’s part for vocational training. Many programs not involved in Workforce LA are explicitly vocational. “Suburban High” has such a program, the instructor indicating that new vocational programs were needed as industrial arts and auto mechanics became less viable.

The second form of world relevance comes in the opportunity to present work to audiences, who tend to value video as entertainment. CVCV is explicit in this concern: “The students’ motivation for learning and using language more effectively in these projects was traced to the fact that they were . . . communicating [italics added] their findings about their own community to a real audience” (Miller and Borowicz, 2003, p. 5). Goodman (2003) also discusses the powerful effect of public screenings on students, noting its motivating effects beforehand and the transformation that occurs in the role students have in the community, which in turn transforms how students see themselves.

This leads to the most fundamental reason for including video production in a high school curriculum: the promotion of learning and development. For the promoters of video production, there is no doubt of its educational value, but as with all non-traditional subjects, administrators and teachers of core academic subjects frequently question its value. The educational value is explicit in the third criterion Workforce LA promotes, that of principles and standards, but a representative noted difficulty in getting some teachers to develop these in their practices ( J. Perry, personal communication, May 29, 2003). Perhaps some of the problem that teachers have in establishing standards is the usual dependence on tests to shape what is to be learned; establishing criteria outside that which the school system will explicitly test is relatively uncommon. CVCV describes their “ultimate goal . . . [as] fostering student achievement . . . [in] analytic/visual thinking and understanding” (Miller and Borowicz, 2003, p. 5), but they do it by integrating video production into more basic courses such as social studies, which on an ideological level has the effect of making video production more of a tool and less of subject within itself. Programs frequently regard this aspect of video as promoting some type of literacy (Reilly, 1998; Goodman, 2003).

A last reason offered for video production is rarely explicit. When explicit, it stresses the personal rather than the political. The goal is that of seeking to empower students. Of the organizations considered, only EVC elaborates on this goal. Goodman (2003) described the world of urban youth as one of exploitation by the media and criminalization by the justice system. Thus EVC seeks “a critical literacy [that] empowers low-income, urban teenagers” (p. 3). Goodman stresses the political potential of video to provide a voice to silenced and exploited populations, thus initiating change. This potential is stressed with a different population by Chalfen (1992), who discusses the political uses of video by indigenous populations as a way to advocate for themselves.

I have found a complimentary potential for empowerment in the student producer’s ability to alter her or his position in the immediate social context through the selection of topics, direction of actors, and manipulation of events and places (Beaty,1998, 2000). By including students in the research process as videographers, Goldman-Segall observed a similar effect in relation to research: Students became “creators of their own cultural artifacts” and thus ceased to be subjects of study (1998, p. 36). In video production—as with all project based inquiry—students become directors of their activities, and the video camera becomes a tool for moving around the school, selecting activities, and influencing the acts of other people. But despite a growing need, political implications are rarely explicit in the design of courses.

The challenge still remains for our nation's schools and after-school programs to effectively teach all students. . . . To fully face this challenge requires the teaching of literacy in a way that organically links the students' development of language with honest exploration of the contemporary world around them in all its aspects, including their treatment at the hands of the criminal justice system and the media culture industries. As producers, authors, and artists fluent in multiple literacies, inner-city youth can frame their own place in society. (Goodman, 2003, p. 31)

Many obstacles exist for schools when undertaking a video production program. Goodman (2003) discusses the lack of recognition by state agencies for media education, the competition for time, a place, and funds, the interdisciplinary nature of video, and the lack of “academic rituals that supposedly give a subject its weight and rigor, such as tests, book reports, and nightly homework” (p. 101). Obtaining funds and a place are only the initial obstacles as teachers confront additional hurdles. It should be of no surprise, therefore, that each of the issues Goodman mentions were active in the courses that were studied.

Vocational programs in video production, or more often “television production” courses, have been instituted more easily because they fit squarely into the existing structure of schools. They are appropriately separated from the more fundamental subjects and reserved for those seeking vocational training or electives, thus losing the interdisciplinary nature of the subject. This separation frequently brings in necessary resources. In California, for example, classes designated as “Regional Occupational Programs” receive additional funds from the counties. Organizations such as Workforce LA are another way around the resource problem, but a potential obstacle to meaningful reform, according to the interviewed representative, is that schools primarily seeking money and equipment are rarely committed to change, thus this organization has removed the enticement of such “riches” as computers, cameras, and studios from their current projects (J. Perry, personal communication, May 29, 2003). There have been a number of grants available for technology in recent years, but getting the equipment is only the first problem.

Video production courses can also struggle with their role within a school once they have been initiated. Teachers at two schools talked about difficulties in having their courses taken seriously by students, other teachers, and administration. Courses can gain legitimization by using textbooks, assigning traditional homework, and having tests of vocabulary and other objective criteria, despite these working in opposition to many reform efforts. The political quest for accountability and evidence-based curriculum (and narrow definitions of evidence) may increasingly necessitate such practices. There is also the needs of the student population, which may include certificates of competence or evidence of “well-roundedness” for college applications. Therefore, actual course have many names, ideologies, and types of resources.

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