On March 24, 2011, U.S. Department of State Under Secretary Judith McHale visited the Peapod Academy/Central Community School in Redwood City, California to participate in a Skype call organized by iEARN-USA and iEARN-Pakistan between students from the United States and Pakistan.
Students from the Peapod Academy in the Redwood City alongside Pakistani students from Karachi and Rawalpindi/Islamabad explored the issue of students in the two countries as producers of knowledge/news/media, instead of simply being consumers, and the impact this has on youth engaged in new media and journalism.
Milton Chen, former Executive Director of the George Lucas Education Foundation facilitated the conversation between students in Redwood City and Pakistan.
“Students on both sides of the conversation have demonstrated how they can be creators of media and knowledge, instead of being simply consumers through the Adobe Youth Voices and the iEARN World Youth News project,†noted iEARN-USA Executive Director Ed Gragert. In both of these initiatives, students learn how to create media and quality news stories, some of which are then picked up by the PBS News Hour for re-publishing on its website.
The Skype conference call came at the launch of a new initiative organized by iEARN-USA, Connect All Schools, through which teachers tell stories of how they have worked with organizations to internationalize their classes.
