Ke Alahele grants support media production classes

On the outside, it’s another classroom.

Inside, room I-102 at Kalama Intermediate School is a conservatory for creative thinking utilizing media technology to enhance communications on the campus.

A trio of Kalama Intermediate 8th graders (from right), Taylor Phillips, Alyssa Gordon and Lisa Fulcher, work at an iMac computer in the Media Production class where they learned the technology to produce an art book, "The Real Anisa." The three also produced an anti-drunk driving video that placed second in the Maui District Video Festival.

An array of 18 iMacs line a wall where students in the last days of the 2008-09 school year reworked video and writing projects using digital media software to create graphic and video art works that will become books, posters or videos to be displayed online, in classrooms and at home.

Much of the student work in video productions, school broadcasts, the school yearbook and graphic design was helped along by two Ke Alahele Education Fund grants to teacher Robin Brooks. The Ke Alahele Fund is a program of the Maui Economic Development Board.

Principal John Costales dug into his budget to buy video and still cameras and four iMacs; a private donation and proceeds from yearbook sales bought more computers and software. An initial $5,000 from Ke Alahele bought a wireless router and three more iMacs in the 2007-08 school year, with an additional $4,700 in the 2008-09 year purchasing drawing software, a digital projector, external hard drives and a color accent device that allows students to manipulate colors in still images — used by three students to create a fantasy story and photo book on fairies, combining images with descriptive prose.

“The three students used the software to create a book of soft images and strong lines,” Brooks said. “They used iPhoto and Pages to edit and we could provide the technology built into the camera to create the images after taking some training on what makes a good photograph.”

Student Taylor Phillips said the concept developed as she, Lisa Fulcher and Alyssa Gordon understood the possibilities with the color accent camera that allows the photographer to select a part of the image to be in color while the rest shows as shades of black and white that can be further manipulated in soft tints.

“What color you want to pop out will be what shows in the picture,” Fulcher explained. “We were able to do it with the color accent camera; not every one will allow you to isolate the color. We wouldn’t have been able to do this without it.”

The collaboration resulted in an 11-page photo book, “The Real Anisa,” with all three involved in the writing and setting up the images for the first and last pages, and each contributing three pages that they wrote and designed on their own following their story line.

“Each of us had our own pages where we kind of wrote our own part of the story,” Phillips said.

A page from "The Real Anisa," a photo book and morality tale by three Kalama Intermediate students, illustrates their use of a color accent camera to create images for their fairy story.

The result is a slender art book of images, with the simplicity of the morality tale of a fairy belying the quality of the learning that took place in producing the book — development of concept, scripting, designing and taking the images, editing and designing each page, pairing written words with complementary images.

Brooks pointed to the instructions posted on how students should be doing their media projects for her classes, a three-step directive on the basics of developing a concept, maintaining the files created in implementing the concept and completing the work. It starts with the students being assured they can develop their own ideas rather than just work on an assignment from their teacher.

“They get so excited,” she said. “As they get familiar with the programs, they learn that they can do something and with all that energy they have, they just go for it.”

A second group of students went for it produced a video, “Chairs,” that took top honors in the intermediate school division of the Maui District Video Festival, placing first among 74 entries. Student Ethan Clark said he and fellow 8th-grader Curtis Palmeria developed the story line, which was a lesson on respect for school property — dealing with graffiti and vandalism.

Clark said he has been doing videography at home for some time and had produced his own videos, but the Kalama Media Production class acquired animation software last year that allowed the students to expand their productions beyond the use of live actors.

“We already had the cameras, but we didn’t have the flash animation and some of the programs that we used for our production,” he said. “I was learning about camera angles and tuning sound effects, different things.”

The rest of the team, Jimmy Wilson, Trevor Natividad and Alden Mel, were involved in plotting, shooting, acting and editing the final product, taking about a month to complete five minutes of video.

Maui District Media Specialist Mark Hymas said the work of the Kalama students stood out, with four of the top five entries in the division submitted by Brooks’ students.

Judging was based on content, values, scripting/storyboarding, creativity, teamwork and technical quality, with students also required to submit summaries on what they learned from creating the video.

“The media professionals who viewed the ‘Chairs’ video felt its creativity and technical complexity stood out from the other projects,” Hymas said.

A second video submitted by Kalama students, a Claymation piece on drunk driving also impressed the judges, three professionals in television video work, he said. The video was produced by the team of Fulcher, Gordon and Phillips.

“Although we hope to see more videos based on values and educational themes, those videos tend not to be interesting to students who are raised on MTV and reality television,” he said.

Brooks, however, is able to establish a balance of social value and creativity with her students, Hymas said.

“A good portion of the projects from Kalama did in fact contain themes related to values and education. Quite frankly, I think this is amazing given the age range she is working with.”

In his first year with the Media Production class, Palmeria said he had a lot to learn about using the cameras, editing, “all that kind of stuff.” Over the school year, he said he developed confidence in what could be accomplished in video format, while learning one of the great drawbacks of electronic media.

“The only thing I didn’t like, after spending all the time editing and I was almost finished, the program just turned off; it was just gone, everything I did.”

Whatever frustrations they may encounter, Brooks’ students — more than 100 7th and 8th graders in six classes on media formats and art — are building on an acquaintance with digital technology to a full understanding of their own abilities and potential.

“Kids coming into my classes already are using the technology. They are using computers, cell phones, cameras. They know about the equipment; they don’t know everything it can do,” she said.

“We provide them access to the latest hardware and software, give them a little direction and they can take off on their own, using their imagination and creativity to produce their own projects.”

While her students work on their fourth-quarter media projects, Kalama Intermediate School teacher Robin Brooks explains the basics of her Media Production curriculum -- which is a project-based learning program.

Brooks said she had to learn herself what the equipment coupled with software can do. Until the Maui District brought in Hymas as a media specialist two years ago, there was little expertise within the Department of Education on teaching students about accessing digital technology. A Maui teacher, Debbie Tisdale, was trained in use of digital systems, held classes on use of technology and produced a training video, Brooks said. But Brooks said she still did much of her learning on the job.

Her classes are for students who utilize technology to communicate — designing and producing stories in a variety of media formats to inform, advise and entertain.

“They’re good kids. They want to do good work. We train them a little in the technology and they take off. They’re more than motivated; they don’t want to stop learning what they can do.”

“When I show up at 6:45 in the morning, I have students waiting outside, demanding to be let in. I’ve never had that happen to me before.”

It all began with commitments to acquire the equipment that supports the classes. Brooks said when she took on the classes, the school didn’t have a working camera.

“I have so many people to thank for their support. God bless my principal, who’s been incredibly supportive even as he acknowledges he knows nothing about using this technology. Without the Ke Alahele grants, we wouldn’t have achieved what we have as quickly. There are just so many who have contributed.”

The Ke Alahele Education Fund is a community investment project to address the growing needs in science, technology, engineering and math education in Maui County and Hawaii.

Donations to the fund from businesses and individuals provide grants to teachers, students, schools and agencies for programs, equipment, facilities and curriculum in STEM education. Grants also have gone to internships for STEM training by technology companies and agencies.

An annual fundraising dinner for the Ke Alahele Fund, “A Pathway to Our Future,” will be held Aug. 21 at the Grand Wailea Resort Hotel & Spa, with featured guests, U.S. Sen. Daniel Inouye, Irene Hirano and Mayor Charmaine Tavares.

To support the fund, go to: www.medb.org/KeAlahele/annualevent.cfm.