Contact:

Susan Weingram (551) 404-3963 / susan@cplmedia.org
Marsha Ralls (202) 316-3917 / marsha-ralls@cplmedia.org

CHILDREN’S PRESSLINE YOUTH JOURNALISTS AGES 11 TO 16 TO COVER DEMOCRATIC AND REPUBLICAN
NATIONAL CONVENTIONS

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

New York, NY – August 13, 2008 – Children’s PressLine, the not-for-profit organization that teaches kids eight to 18 to be journalists, today announced that a team of its New York-based youth journalists will cover both the Democratic and Republican National Conventions, traveling to Denver and Minneapolis respectively. From each convention, these youth journalists will work on assignment from media partners including the Minneapolis Star Tribune, Metro USA (New York, Boston and Philadelphia) and PBS NewsHour’s online edition, producing three or more stories per day.

Ten children, ages 11 to 16, will cover the Democratic convention and nine will cover the Republican convention. In each city, Children’s PressLine will set up headquarters that will serve as home base. Each youth journalist will attend and produce coverage on convention activities including receptions and state caucuses, as well as conduct interviews with delegates, governors, senators, members of Congress and presidential candidates. Stories for PBS’s NewsHour will be written from a teen-to-teen perspective. All stories will be written for a mainstream adult audience, conveying youth perspective on youth-related issues.

The conventions provide an immersion-learning environment for Children’s PressLine journalists. Team members will assume real responsibilities in a professional environment and will compete for interviews with adult reporters. Each will execute all facets of journalistic work, including story development, research, reporting, interviewing and writing articles for Children’s PressLine’s media partners. In this real-world environment, these children will gain a true sense of their capabilities as journalists and their responsibility to cover youth issues for an adult audience.

Six adult members of Children’s PressLine’s staff, including newly elected CEO and Publisher Marsha Ralls, will attend the conventions with the CPL youth reporters and editors. These adults will provide the support and training the youth journalists need to create a learning environment that focuses on professionalism and civic engagement. The adult staff will also manage organizational requirements such as media partnerships and travel logistics.

Children’s PressLine, together with its predecessor organization Children’s Express, has covered every major political convention since 1976. Within the organization, coverage of presidential conventions is recognized as an honor and a privilege of mythical proportion. To date, each youth journalist has met and exceeded the challenge. In fact, at its first convention, a Children’s Express reporter scooped the mainstream press, breaking the news that Jimmy Carter was choosing Walter Mondale as his running mate. In 2004, Children’s PressLine was the only youth organization that had convention-credentialed press passes for the RNCC.

Youth coverage of major political events is vital in a democracy. Through Children’s PressLine, young people, who make up 26% of the population, ask questions directly to politicians and policymakers and provide them with information they need to make educated decisions. Children’s PressLine’s coverage of the Democratic and Republican National Conventions is made possible, in part, by key partners including the Colorado High School Press Association, Philips Community Television, University of St. Thomas’s youth journalism program and ThreeSixty Journalism in St. Paul, Minnesota.

ABOUT CHILDREN’S PRESSLINE:
Children's PressLine is a not-for-profit organization that trains kids aged eight to 18 to be journalists. What sets CPL apart is that our young journalists report and edit stories targeted to adult audiences as well as kids. Major broadcast and print media outlets across the country air and print these stories, including over 400 newspapers nationwide such as the New York Daily News, Metro New York, New York Amsterdam News, Tweens and Teens News and more.  

Children’s PressLine is heir to a 26-year-old tradition of integrating youth perspective into mainstream media. A spin-off of Children’s Express – the only youth-produced news organization to win both Emmy and Peabody Awards - CPL seeks to continue empowering the voice of youth, serving as a window to the hearts and minds of this under heard and underserved community. The result is an unquestionably authentic, graceful and mature approach to the search for truth.

PDF of Press Release: Click Here