Academic Studio Integrated Humanities Citizen Journalism
12th Grade Humanities Students Examine Modern US Justice System in Partnership with Lara Naughton and Tom Lowenstein
As a special addition to the collaborative project-based curriculum offered in the NOCCA full-day Academic Studio, Humanities faculty have set a new semester challenge for their senior students. Meeting every Thursday morning, 12th Grade NOCCA Integrated Humanities, taught by Byron Lilly and Dr. Spree MacDonald, are working with NOCCA’s Creative Writing Department Chair Lara Naughton and journalist Tom Lowenstein, of the New Orleans Journalism Project, to examine experiences with the modern U.S. criminal justice system through methods of citizen journalism.
Using active listening and other compassion-cultivation techniques, skillful questioning, research, and narrative and script writing techniques, students will research the modern criminal justice system in the U.S. Beginning with personal reflection, verbal storytelling and community interviews, these projects will scale up into original monologues that explore individuals’ experiences with the criminal justice system.
Students will showcase these projects in partnership with University of New Orleans, Ashe Cultural Arts Center, Louisiana Center for Children’s Rights, and other partner schools at two events at the end of the semester. They will then submit their projects for consideration in the “Global Dialogues on Incarceration” travelling exhibit coordinated by The New School’s Humanities Action Lab.