A new collaboration between a Boston and a New York organization will allow teenage girls to publish original articles about social justice issues.
WriteBoston and Women’s eNews in September will continue the work of Teen Voices, a 25-year-old nonprofit based in Boston that mentored high school girls and developed their writing skills. Mentors helped small groups of teenage girls with the editorial process of a news story, including researching, interviewing, and writing. Their ultimate goal was publication in the quarterly magazine, Teen Voices(tagline: “Changing the world for girls through media”), distributed internationally. Their articles were also published on a website that attracted more than 20,000 subscribers.
WriteBoston will extend its Teens in Print program to recruit Boston public high school girls who will meet weekly to write about issues pertaining to women around the world. Their stories will be published in Teens in Print, a citywide newspaper funded by The Boston Globe that is written by and for high school and middle school students. Ultimately, they can be featured on Women’s eNews for online international recognition alongside professionally reported and produced pieces.
“We feel strongly that the way to teach kids to write is to teach them to write about issues they care about,” Betty Southwick, executive director of WriteBoston, told msnbc.
The collaboration will allow Women’s eNews, based in New York City, to include specific content about teen girls, for teen girls.
Teen Voices focused on issues that ranged from women making a difference and how to handle discouragement from pursuing careers in math or science, to LGBT youth and preparing for college.
The Teen Voices board dissolved and ended its operations on June 18.
“If we can start small and make it happen,” Southwick said, “it seems like such a worthwhile thing, and I think we can grow it.”
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Michele Richinick