Feature Story

In the aftermath of tragedies, newspapers often lead the way in their steadfastness and coverage. One youth section and one NIE department show the huge role that a newspaper can play in helping to comfort and inform the community.

By Dinah Eng

Following the tsunami, The Toronto Star youth section supplement Brand New Planet tried to help young people process their feelings and learn from the disaster.

When a tsunami shocked the world on Dec. 26, killing more than 150,000 people in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand and other nations in the Indian Ocean region, schools in Toronto were closed for the holidays. Fortunately, a youth section filled the void.

When hurricanes struck Florida last fall, the Pensacola (Fla.) News Journal came to the rescue by proposing a home-schooling program that would tutor elementary school students until damaged schools could reopen.

These are just two examples of youth sections and NIE departments stepping up when tragedies step down. They provide practical assistance as well as great lessons for students who may be dealing with such events for the first time.

Sue Grimbly, editor of The Toronto Star’s Brand New Planet section, knew she had to get word of the tragedy to the young readers of the publication. Like many involved in NIE and youth pages, she used the newspaper to help young people process their feelings and learn from the disaster.

“I handled the tsunami coverage by running a little story on our Web site that a Toronto-based Sri Lankan girl sent me,” says Grimbly, also a section editor at the Star. “It was about how she woke up
on Boxing Day [the day after Christmas] to find her parents trying to find out if her grandparents were okay.”

Since the youngster was interested in following the news stories, Grimbly asked her to send what she found interesting every day, and then she posted it on the Web site.

“When we finally published on January 16, we ran some great letters from kids,” Grimbly says. “Kids all over the city of Toronto were doing fund-raising and also wanted to tell their story. We approached the issue of photos by trying to accentuate the positive, or at least not be gruesome.”

The Pensacola (Fla.) News Journal NIE project, “Survivin’ Ivan,” provided home-schooling for elementary school students until schools damaged by the latest storm could reopen a month later.

Planeteer cub reporter Katie Spreekmeester, 10, started her own fund-raising drive to give money to UNICEF for tsunami relief by asking her hockey team for contributions. Schools in the Toronto area began holding fund-raising events that included a sleepover moviethon and appearances by local celebrities.

“Before the tsunami happened, I had begun to lose faith in the human race and good-heartedness in people,” an eighth-grader wrote to Brand New Planet. “But now I see people all over the world, of every background, young and old, pitching in to help people hurt by the tsunami, and behind the sadness of the tragedy, I see hope.”

Around the world, NIE programs and newspapers aimed at young people responded with coverage that made a difference.

“We know now that newspapers for children, just like those for adults, absolutely need to take their readers seriously, telling them the facts in a clear and concise fashion in words they can understand, with photos that show people like them, and illustrations that clearly explain the relevant details,” says Aralynn Abare McMane, director of development and education for the World Association of Newspapers.

“We’ve received examples in several countries of newspapers that did just that,” she adds. “Further, these publications for children also gave families a great tool to use when discussing both the horrible event itself and how children can help the rescue and rebuilding effort.”

While the tsunami is the most recent natural disaster to hit the front pages, NIE coordinators have aided numerous communities in the aftermath of local tragedies and proved the worth of newspapers in the classroom.

NIE Gets Busy

Sheila Reed, NIE director at the Pensacola (Fla.) News Journal, came to the rescue of the Escambia County School District after hurricanes struck Florida last fall by proposing a home-schooling program that would tutor elementary school students until schools damaged by the latest storm could reopen a month later.

“We had piles of debris from 2–30 feet deep surrounding us, not to mention the dead bodies,” Reed recalls. “The students needed to process that, so we used the hurricane as the focus of the tabs. We put together six tabs with lesson plans to teach math, reading, writing, science and geography, and did it within a 10-day time frame, working around the clock.”
Five of the six tabs were mailed to the homes of more than 60,000 students, with lessons and activities that would be given to teachers when they returned to school. The last issue was delivered to the classroom when schools reopened.

The project, dubbed “Survivin’ Ivan,” was paid for by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, resulting in $135,000
in underwritten NIE papers and curriculum tabs.

“The governor’s office is rewriting its guidelines on crisis management [in education] because of what we did,” Reed says. “Newspapers are incredibly powerful tools, but we have a tendency to think of them only as a vehicle for delivery of information. You can harness it in a different way to have a powerful impact on the community. I look at NIE as a way for the newspaper to help fill the gap in schools where needed.”

Steve Gondelman, NIE coordinator of The Press of Atlantic City, N.J., says he hit the ground running when he joined the newspaper two weeks after Sept. 11, 2001.
“I thought, what would I have wanted if I was the social studies teacher in the classroom?” says Gondelman, a former high school social studies teacher in New York City. “We purchased a supplement and got it into the schools immediately.

“I called every school I could get to, offering them the supplement, the newspaper and myself to come into the classroom if they wanted it. We gave out 30,000 to 40,000 copies, which was phenomenal, and a lot of people wanted the paper in the classroom after that.”

Gondelman, who has 34 years of experience as a teacher, wishes that newspapers would think more of young readers when tragedies hit and solicit comments from them for stories as a matter of course.
“It would be a positive move to help young people get it out of their systems,” he says. “It would keep people informed and would provide an outlet for students to voice their concerns and see that adults care about what they think.”

Freelance columnist Dinah Eng writes for Presstime and Gannett News Service. She can be reached at dinaheng@earthlink.net.

Covering Tragedy–11 Tips Tragedies and Journalists, A Guide for More Effective Coverage, presents tips for interviewing, writing the story, covering the community, taking pictures and managing in times of uncertainty and fear. Sponsored by the Dart Center for Journalism & Trauma and the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, the printing of the guide was supported by Hearst Newspapers and the Houston Chronicle. Here are 11 tips from the guide:  1. You can say you’re sorry for the person’s loss, but never say “I understand” or “I know how you feel.”  2. Don’t overwhelm with the hardest questions first.  3. Use pertinent details that help describe victims as they lived or provide images of their lives.  4. Find ways people are helping, including acts of kindness, and report on them throughout the recovery process. This may provide hope for the community.  5. Take breaks. A few minutes or a few hours away from the situation may help relieve your stress.  6. Do everything possible to avoid violating someone’s private grieving.  7. Appoint a person to monitor the staff’s well-being who can make recommendations to you about it.  8. Encourage staffers to do things to help themselves. Post tips on bulletin boards and include them in memos and e-mails.  9. Write stories about the victims’ lives and their effect on your community. These are short stories about people, their favorite hobbies, what made them special and the ripple effect of their humanity. 10. Provide forums on what people are thinking, especially words of encouragement. Offer lists of ways people can help and how they have helped. 11. Find ways that people are helping, including acts of kindness, and report on them through the recovery process. This may provide hope for the community. The guide can be ordered or read online at www.dartcenter.org.

 

Published Apr 25, 2005