The media training will come as part of a series The Consortium launched in May, when it co-hosted its first Digital Storytelling Symposium with Douglas Education Center in Monessen, said Steve Seliy, Associate Executive Director. While the series is not part of the TFIM program, Seliy noted that TFIM advisors and students are welcome and likely would find that digital storytelling helps build communications skills that employers find essential in the workplace but often lacking in young people they hire. Seliy also distributed copies of A Whole New Mind, a book by Daniel H. Pink, that suggests the digital age has produced a generation of youngsters who communicate best through stories. TFIM was broadly represented at the May symposium, a “blended” professional development opportunity that brought students and teachers together to learn side by side. The next Digital Storytelling Symposium is scheduled for October 17, at the Pittsburgh Marriott City Center, Downtown.

During a warm-up exercise designed to stimulate conversation about TFIM’s accomplishments in the past year and about ideas for 2009-2010, advisors tossed a beach ball covered with written questions about how their teams met program goals, among other things. They responded to queries that their fingers touched.

For Thom Kostelac from Monessen City High School, that meant explaining a project his team undertook that not only achieved an important goal, but also became a way of interesting other students in TFIM. The project was a Saturday community cleanup during which TFIM participants painted parking meter stanchions, among other tasks. As the team painted, peers who stopped to see what they were doing also asked about joining TFIM.

“It worked like a recruiting measure,” Kostelac said, while also involving TFIM participants in their community.

While TFIM’s main goal is helping students explore careers, it also aims to stimulate community engagement and leadership development. Participants perform three projects each year, one individually and two in teams, that help them meet one or more of the program objectives. Education research suggests that career exploration and team-based learning deepen engagement in classroom learning.

Preliminary conclusions from an evaluation The Consortium commissioned suggest that the program not only is achieving all of its main goals, but also helping students build skills valued in any workplace, including improved communications. Based on extensive surveys of advisors and students, the evaluation found, among other things that:

• 82 percent of students deemed TFIM instrumental in helping them identify careers that matched their interests and abilities, with more than a third describing the program as very instrumental;
• Almost 88 percent of students described TFIM as instrumental in getting them more involved in their schools and communities, with more than 45 percent describing the program as very instrumental.
• Nearly 89 percent advisors found TFIM instrumental in connecting students with people in fields that interest them, with nearly 40 percent describing the program as very instrumental;
• Nearly 93 percent of advisors found TFIM instrumental in helping students make the connection between classroom learning and the world of work, with almost half rating the program very instrumental.

The Consortium shared those results with advisors at their June meeting and expects to receive the final evaluation later in the summer. Complete details will be released as soon as they become available.