WALKING ON AIR...

Students in the Brunswick City School District’s Video Program are walking on air thanks to their on-air efforts.

The BEAT, Brunswick Educational Access Television channel 22 has been selected as the 2009 Hometown Video Award winner by the Alliance for Community Media. This is the second time in four years the BEAT has won the award in its classification – overall excellence in educational access, budget under $200,000. The Hometown Video Awards received nearly 1,200 entries this year.

The Video Program has also been chosen as the official student video documentary team for the 2009 Ohio School Boards Association Capital Conference in November. This is the first time OSBA has selected a student team to document its statewide conference, which draws more than 10,000 education leaders from across Ohio.

Rounding out the triple header of recent announcements, the program was selected as a finalist by Time Warner Cable for its National Teacher Awards from a large field of entries. The National Teacher Awards represent some of the best efforts across the country and show how cable resources can be part of unique classroom learning experiences for students. While the program wasn’t the winner, making the finalist list is a huge accomplishment.

The Brunswick Video Program takes a journalistic approach to video production with students, starting in the sixth grade, learning to recognize a good story, writing it for print and the program’s Web page, how to conduct interviews in the cable studio and in the field and then how to edit and produce the final product.

Over the past year, the “veteran” students, ranging from seventh grade to high school juniors, also won the Ohio Center for Broadcasting video commercial award and the SportsTime Ohio "B.U.M.P." excellence in broadcasting award.

John Wasylko, communications director for the district is the chief advisor for the club. He has worked with video for 30 years. He is aided by longtime newspaper reporter, ‘Sam’ Boyer.

“We are very proud of the accomplishments of our students,” Wasylko said, “and for the effort they put into this extracurricular activity. It takes a lot of time and commitment for them to put what they are learning into action.”

The BEAT features between 125-150 shows annually with students providing news programs. Other programming includes Brunswick Memories – interviews with longtime residents; SportsBeat -- interviews about and with local sports figures; Board of Education meetings; sports events; concerts and other special events in the district.

The BEAT produces between 125-150 shows annually. "Our programming is very eclectic."

The program’s Web site features links to streaming video of programs aired on the BEAT and Open Lines Online, the program’s news page.

For more information, contact Wasylko at (330) 441-2259 or jwasylko@bcsoh.org.