Posts filed under ‘Youth’
Sharing BrdsNBz Success at 2012 SexTech Conference, April 1-4
The 2012 Sex::Tech Conference is enjoying it’s fourth year and we’ve been chosen to speak on a panel including not only APPCNC but also Deb Levin, SexTech founder, and Jonathan Holly from Educational Messaging Services.
OneSeventeen’s public-private partnership with the Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Campaign of North Carolina (APPCNC) will share the success as the first text messaging service for sexual health education. Kennon Jackson, Jr. (APPCNC) and Jessica Fitts Willoughby will discuss “Adolescents’ Questions about Pregnancy Posed to an Interactive Text Message Service.”
Just in case you’re in SF and attending SexTech, be sure to stop by and hear Kennon and Jessica. Here’s a brief abstract of their panel discussion:
Want to know what questions adolescents really have about what leads to pregnancy? We examined the questions asked of a sexual health text messaging service promoted to North Carolina teens ages 14 to 19. BrdsNBz North Carolina allows adolescents to text a question to the service and receive a personalized response within 24 hours from trained health educators. Adolescents had a number of questions about pregnancy, mainly what situations can lead to pregnancy (60%). They wanted to know whether anal sex and oral sex could lead to pregnancy, if having sex when a girl is on her period could lead to pregnancy, and if having sex underwater could lead to pregnancy. Adolescents also often wanted to know how to detect and prevent pregnancy. Knowing what questions adolescents have may help health educators address them before they come up. Come find out what teens really want to know about pregnancy.
Stand Up To Cancer Strikes a Cord with Teens
Did you know that 1 in 2 men and 1 out of three women will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetimes. In fact, there’s not a person that exists that has not been affected in some way by cancer. Stand Up To Cancer ‘s one-hour, commercial-free telecast aired on Friday, September 10, 2010 on over a dozen channels and over 30 online streaming partners like AOL, Yahoo! and YouTube. The SU2C broadcast was dedicated to the over 12 million U.S. cancer survivors illustrating how groundbreaking research can change the tide in the fight against the disease. Since 2008, Stand Up To Cancer has raised more than $100 million for cancer research.
The all-star line-up of presenters, performers and phone operators who gave up their time to help raise funds for cancer research charities and awareness about the killer disease included teen stars Naya Rivera, Vanessa Hudgens, Brenda Song, and Logan Lerman. The goal is to raise awareness and funds for research but, more importantly, to inspire, inform, and support young adults face to face with cancer and build an understanding of what is happening to them and their family; acknowledging the sense of uncertainty and introduce healthy ways of dealing with feelings and changes.
Many teens are at a time in their lives when they are trying to break away and be independent from their parents. When a parent has cancer, breaking away can be hard for them to do. They may become angry, act out, or get into trouble.
Trying to get teens to talk about their feelings is already difficult. Telling them as much as they want to know about cancer is a start. Asking their opinions and, if possible, letting them help make decisions is also helpful.
Teens may want to talk with other people in their lives. Friends can be a great source of support, especially those who also have serious illness in their family. Other family members, teachers, coaches, and spiritual leaders can also help. Encouraging teenage children to talk about their fears and feelings with people they trust and feel close to is essential. Some towns even have support groups for teens whose parents/family members have cancer.
Stand Up To Cancer raises funds to hasten the pace of groundbreaking translational research that can get new therapies to patients quickly and save lives. The show is over but Stand Up To Cancer is still accepting donations online at www.su2c.org. 100% of the funds received from the public go to research.
Teens Are Speechless When It Comes to Technology – But Is That Such A Bad Thing?
Not long ago, prattling away on the phone was as much a teenage rite as hanging out at the mall. Flopped on the bed, you yakked into your pink or football-shaped receiver until your parents hollered at you to get off. Today’s teens, however, prefer their Sidekicks and their Blackberries and their Razor phones, not to talk, but to text.
They do it late at night when their parents are asleep. They do it in restaurants and while crossing busy streets. They do it in the classroom with their hands behind their back. They do it so much their thumbs hurt.
Daily text messaging among teens has increased from 38 percent of teens texting friends daily in 2008, to 54 percent of teens texting daily in 2009. The average teen sends and receives 50 or more messages per day, or 1,500 per month, according to a new report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
Boys typically send and receive 30 texts a day while girls send and receive 80 messages per day. Older girls are the most active texters, with 14-17 year old girls sending 100 or more messages a day or more than 3,000 texts a month.
All this texting is making employers and communications experts anxious: This generation may be technologically savvier than their bosses, but will they be able to have a professional discussion?
“We are losing very natural, human, instinctive skills that we used to be really good at,” says Sonya Hamlin, author of How to Talk So People Listen: Connecting in Today’s Workplace.
A couple of years ago, Hamlin was asked to teach a class of “very bright” California high school seniors about the college admissions interview. Their mock answers were “extremely short and not informational. Nothing came out, really, because it’s such an unused skill.”
So are today’s teens losing their verbal communication skills?
Part of the reason, Hamlin says, is because “they’re not listening. With IM, you can reread six times before deciding how to answer.” There’s no improvisation, she says, none of the spontaneity of phone banter or a face-to-face chat. “Talk is a euphemism. We do it now in quotes,” Hamlin says.
And when face-to-face chats do occur, there are other verbal kinks. Stefani Beser, a freshman at Villa Julie College near Baltimore, texts so much — 20-40 times a day “if there’s a lot going on” — that the shorthand creeps into her live conversation. “You’ll be talking and all of sudden you’ll say, ‘Oh, LOL or OMG,’ ” text-speak for “laughing out loud” and “Oh My Goodness”.
But has all this texting improved the amount of communication overall?
Back home, teens text their moms regularly telling them where they are. Teachers send reminders about class projects and homework. Boyfriends and girlfriends even court each other through Facebook and then IM to get to know each other better via a digital relationship:
The primacy of the keyboard has been, well, a lifeline to the kind of guys who, a generation ago, grasped the family room receiver with a sweaty palm and a pounding heart. IM “makes life easier, absolutely,” says Nick Kacher, 17, a junior from Waltham, Mass. “I’m not a big sit-around-and-chat-on-the-phone kind of person.” Friends, and girlfriends, would needle him about his phone phobia. Now, with IM, “I definitely do chat.”
In the meanwhile, phone companies are tapping into teens’ tapping tendencies. Virgin Mobile unveiled its Switch Back, a kind of junior BlackBerry with a qwerty keyboard and AOL IM built in. “We really think that text is the new talk,” the company’s Howard Handler says. A quarter of Virgin Mobile’s teen customers use their phones for texting more than talking. “We are living in a 160-character nation,” the maximum text message length, Handler declares. Today most cell phone plans include a Media Package focused on texting rather than phone minutes.
So is texting a helping teens socially, or limiting them? These two schools of thought will play out in this new generation of young texters while our daily lives and vocabulary picks up more SMS language, (Short Message Service text slang), on a regular basis.
Spread the Word to End the Word
Across the United States and around the globe, young people have joined a movement of mutual respect and human dignity called Spread the Word to End the Word. The goal: get people to stop and think about their hurtful and disparaging use of the word “retard” and pledge to stop using it.
Spread the Word to End the Word was created by youth with and without intellectual disabilities who participated in the Special Olympics Global Youth Activation Summit at the 2009 Special Olympics World Winter Games. The motivation for the campaign was driven by a united passion to promote the positive contributions people with intellectual disabilities make to communities around the world combined with a simple call to action – a pledge to stop using a word – that also symbolizes positive attitude change and a commitment to make the world a more accepting place for all people.
We found that almost all youth have heard the r-word and most have heard it used by a friend or a student at school. We also found that youth react differently to the r-word if it is directed at a person with a disability or if a friend says the word.
Half of youth (51%) said that they felt bad or sorry for the person being picked. Some responded that they either laughed or didn’t care when they heard the r-word and many (39%) said that they did nothing. Some youth (33%) took a stand and told the person it was wrong to say the r-word.
What YOU Can Do
Join he cause and the Spread the Word to End the Word’s Project UNIFY movement in schools around the U.S. Motivate your friends to get involved with a variety of fun youth activities. You can even contribute five minutes to take the Spread the Word to End the Word pledge.
Get in the game by joining Special Olympics Unified Sports®, where people with and without intellectual disabilities train and compete together on the same team.
Know someone with an intellectual disability? Refer them to a Special Olympics program nearby, and for more information, go to http://www.specialolympics.org/.
19 Days and Counting
Only 19 days left to register for the Young Minds Digital Times Student Film Competition. We have fantastic prizes for our winners, including two Grand Prize packages to attend the 2011 South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Texas. Other first place category winners will take home $200 in cold, hard cash. The teacher with the most student film entries, and the school with the most student film entries in Track One: Young Filmmakers Doing Good, will each win $1000! But you have to register first!!
Registration is open until February 19th. The competition is free to all student filmmakers grades 6-8 and 9-12. Film entries are due March 19th. And check the rest of our blog posts for filmmaking tips and tricks.
Sailing Alone Around The World
Post by Beth Carls, CEO, OneSeventeen Media & Co-Founder, KidThrive.org
Good Morning America reported Sunday morning on 16-year old Australian Jessica Watson’s quest to be the youngest person to sail solo, non stop, unassisted around the world. Jessica reports on her web site that her inspiration came from two pioneer sailors: 
Kay Cottee, the first woman to sail solo non-stop and unassisted around the world, and fellow Australian, Jesse Martin, the youngest person to do so.
While many of us might not set our sights on a goal like sailing around the world, we can take inspiration from the goal of this young woman. Even when it seemed her trip may not happen when, less than 24 hours before her departure, her yacht, Ella’s Pink Lady, was struck by a 63,000 tonne bulk carrier and sustained considerable damage, Jessica did not give up. What an inspiration she can be to us and our youth on the importance of goal setting! She shares her route and rules on her site and reported today the weather seems to be cooperating for her to depart Sydney, Australia toward Northern New Zealand around the middle of the coming week.
Jessica was born May 18, 1993 on the Gold Coast and currently lives in Buderim, Australia. Her mantra is: Always make the best of everything, Positive, ask questions, lots of questions. Her interests include: Anything outdoors and on the water, camping, the beach, reading, cooking, weather, fencing, dingy sailing, boat design and CHOCOLATE!
If you’d like to follow her 8-month journey, you can find her blog and other information on her web site.
Good luck, Jessica!
Film Competition Opens Today! Register NOW!
Registration is now open in the Young Minds Digital Times Film Competition (YMDT) 2009-2010! “Studio Chief” Converge magazine has a fantastic article about the competition on their website – “Lights, Camera, Interaction.” You can also check out the official YMDT Filmmaker Blog Buzz where you’ll find weekly tips, tricks, advice and news related to the competition.
There are new categories, prizes and sponsors in this year’s competition, and we hope you’ll choose to join YMDT as a student participant or by encouraging kids you know to sign up for this great opportunity. They competition also makes an excellent class project!
Countdown to Young Minds Digital Times ’09-’10!
The second year of the Young Minds Digital Times Film Competition (YMDT) is just days away! Starting September 28, students can register to participate in the ’09-’10 Competition. This year’s competition is co-sponsored by KidThrive.org and Converge magazine. As always, there’s no fee to participate. You’ll find all the details live on the YMDT website starting on the 28th. Some exciting improvements to this year’s competition based on your feedback:
- Expanded time line — films due in February 2010
- Larger cash prizes for students
- $1000 cash prizes for the teacher and school with the most entries
- Two new categories to show off your work
Be sure to check back September 28 for all the details! We can’t wait to see what you’ve been up to!
Kids Prefer Life Online, Choose Correct Behavior
ReadWriteWeb shares that in a study of 14-21 year-olds, MySpace found that, “Some 36% of the respondents said they found it easier to talk about themselves online than in the real world, leading them to share more about themselves using technology.” For their younger counterparts who’ve never known life without social networks and text messaging, I’d guess that the percentage preferring to share online would be even higher.
MySpace’s numbers make total sense to us. For nearly a decade, OneSeventeen Media’s team members have been creating interactive experiences for kids online; we see technology as an opportunity to connect with kids who don’t always feel comfortable reaching out for help or support in face-to-face interactions. This isn’t to say online interactions should replace real life ones, but often the right online tool can serve as the first step in improving offline relationships.
So often it’s the doom-and-gloom reports about kids online that catch mainstream media attention, and Anastasia Goodstein presents a fresh look at information and youth behavior online:
“- 63% of teens said they DO NOT USE social networks to make fun of other students
- 87% of teens said they HAVE NOT posted naked or semi-naked photos or videos of themselves.
- 76% of teens said they HAVE NOT signed on to someone else’s account without permission
- 72% of teens HAVE NOT posted personal information that they normally would not have revealed in publicI would say wow, most teens are using this technology pretty responsibly…”
While there’s still room for improvement and educating kids as digital citizens, I greatly appreciate Anastasia framing the numbers to give kids the benefit of the doubt. There’s a strong majority of kids choosing to do the right things online, and that’s encouraging news!
Today’s Kids: Expensive, But Not Worse Behaving
A Canadian study reports that today’s kids behave no worse than their parents;
“The conventional vices such as smoking, drinking and occasional marijuana use are all down from Bibby’s earlier Teen Project Canada studies dating back to the 1980s. So are the teen problems of the sort highlighted by the media such as depression, suicide and bullying, according to his 2008 survey of 5,200 teens from coast to coast.”
While it might be mildly reassuring that this generation of teens and tweens are no worse off than their parents, the expansive media coverage on youth issues should make us aware of many individuals were previously falling through the cracks unnoticed. Twenty-first century tweens and teens are often criticized for their over-sharing, but when kids are willing to open up through new media tools, there’s a unique opportunity for us to provide support and resources to help navigate their struggles. At OneSeventeen Media, we’re motivated around using social media to connect kids with the tools for success that weren’t readily accessible a generation ago.
Another (expensive) sign of the times: the average family will spend $221,000 to raise a child born in 2008 to age 17, according to a USDA report that’s been widely covered the last few days. This is no small chunk of change, but as Joanne Jacobs points out, the figure could be quite inaccurate. On Jacobs’ blog, there are some interesting comments where a single mom explains the number sounds low:
“Overestimates? If anything, it underestimates. I’m a single parent in Southern California, living in a middle-class neighborhood. It costs me $500 MORE a month to rent a 2-bedroom apt. than a 1-bedroom. If I rented a house for optimal “family raising” conditions, it would cost even more. So already, we’re talking $108,000 just for him not to share a room with his mom. Even with extra-cheap child care until he turns 12, we’re talking $40,000 more. It would cost more than that for a parent to stay home for 12 years. That’s $148,000, and we haven’t even gotten to health insurance, medical expenses, food, or clothing yet.”
(Image found here)
