Youth Video Program Development
Organization:
Coalition for Asian Pacific American Youth (CAPAY) VISTA Name:
Janet Hong Vo
Program Start:
7/2008
Program End:
7/2009
Project Description:
- Create training curriculum (including Asian American content as well as technical skills for video projects).
- Recruit, train, and supervise volunteers involved with the project.
- Develop and implement dissemination plan for videos once created.
- Develop community partnerships and collaborations to build sustainability of the program into future years.
- Organize fundraising events for Media Justice and CAPAY programs.
- Develop and implement outreach and organizing plan to connect video projects with community members.
- Develop evaluation plan to determine impact of project on youth participants and community.
- Create infrastructure within the university setting which allows for youth participation at a maximal level.
Project Outcome:
During the first six months of 2008-2009, Janet was instrumental in producing several new training and curriculum resources — some content-rich and some with the purpose of media/technology application/integration. These included an extensive draft curriculum centered on the historic local Chinese burial grounds of Mount Hope Cemetery that included production of three new digital stories.
She provided critical programming leadership in the organizing of a major Asian American youth symposium in November 2008 that included workshops on Media Justice, Web 2.0 resources, digital storytelling, Asian American history, and community activism.
She also constructed an important database of active Asian American youth and Asian American educators from the metro Boston area.
During the final six months, Janet focused on the launching of the Dorchester Youth Initiative (DYI) — a CAPAY-led program to address critical issues facing Vietnamese American youth and their families and community in Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood. Janet designed much of the content-rich curriculum with an emphasis on youth/community media. Given the limited capacity of other Vietnamese American community-based organizations to focus on youth issues, Janet also worked to establish crucial relationships with a range of community partners, leading to the organizing and documentation of youth/parent forums in the community. She was primarily supported by the CAPAY coordinator, Tri Quach, and a team of three bilingual Vietnamese American college students from UMass Boston whom she recruited as volunteers to help with the launching and implementation of the DYI.
Janet was not able to devote as much time/effort to the fundraising aspects listed in the position description as we had initially hoped would be possible. She did assist with one major fundraising event (an Asian community dessert tasting held at the Vietnamese American Community Center in Dorchester that benefitted CAPAY and other collaborating organizations). She also researched potential funding sources and developed a useful outline for new funding proposals, but did not actually submit any completed proposals during her term of service.
Impact Quote:
“Janet’s work in producing tangible resources such as video projects, training curricula, and a more robust website portal for CAPAY (in progress) represent important contributions to our organizational capacity with impact beyond the period of time of Janet’s own service. Janet’s leadership to the DYI project creates a platform for CAPAY, together with other community partners, to develop longer-term organizing, programming, and funding opportunities.”
- Peter Kiang, supervisor