DIGITAL AND INTERACTIVE MEDIA: Indeah Lane
Miami Palmetto Senior High senior and Silver Knight Digital and Interactive Media nominee Indeah Lane created a digital storytelling website called I Teach Children History (ITCH). As the mass book ban continues to take over the United States, Lane created ITCH to help counteract its effects.
“The initial reason I wanted to start ITCH is because you can not learn history if it is not there. I feel like without books, students are not able to hear about history and stories that surround them. Personally, I think other students and myself feel that if we do not have people to share stories with, how will we learn anything,” Lane said.
Currently, the stories on the website are written exclusively by African American writers and are accessible to all students.
“I’ve spotted a lot of students after they have read the stories on the website and they felt like they belonged more in African American culture because the website has stories that are very relatable to the students to help them feel not alone,” Lane said.
To get ITCH up and running, Lane had to learn to persevere through setbacks, particularly when the website launch was moving slower than she hoped.
“I had to get the stories from the ground up. I emailed so many organizations and authors, but a lot of the emails I sent have been no response. So, what I learned the most with this project was to keep going even though there is a lot of rejection in the process,” Lane said.
Lane expresses how the main foundation she aimed to create for her website was to allow students to connect with their own cultural identity, since it has been drastically impacted by the mass book ban.
“Seeing the impact of [ITCH], I know that it has positively affected me but seeing that these kids have also benefitted from it it has to be the best part,” Lane said.
Being a nominee for Silver Knight means a lot to Lane, since she has put hundreds of hours into ITCH.
“Even though I have seen the positive social and numerical effect, it is another thing to be able to be recognized by my community for a project that means so much to me and my younger self,” Lane said.
For the future, Lane wants to continue ITCH to continue to add more stories as well as reach more audiences.
“I hope to see ITCH reach students from all 50 states and expand to other marginalized groups such as the LGBTQ+ community, Hispanics, Native Americans, and Jews, so they can also feel a greater sense of belonging in their community even though their voices are being silenced with the banned books,” Lane said.
DRAMA: Sabrina Donet
Miami Palmetto Senior High senior and Silver Knight Drama nominee Sabrina Donet has been on a mission to help orchestra students continue their talents from middle to high school. With her experience with instruments, Donet has brought her knowledge to her old middle school to be able to tutor orchestra students.
Donet created her project called Strings Attached after noticing a lot of students quitting orchestra after leaving middle school.
“The main purpose of Strings Attached is to provide free access to tutoring for music students at my old middle school. In ninth grade, I noticed that fewer and fewer kids were continuing music into high school. So, I wanted to be able to inspire more kids to be able to do that and to give them a resource that helps them bridge the gap between the technique they have in eighth grade and what is expected in high school,” Donet said.
Strings Attached is a project that Donet has been working on since ninth grade. Though Donet had to undergo knee surgery and her recovery brought a halt to the project, she was able to revive the project this year with the new addition of virtual tutoring lessons.
“There are some students who have trouble getting past their auditions because there is a big difference between middle school and high school. It is harder to audition when you do not have a tutor and they are expensive. I saw a lot of these things happening and I wanted to have a few days a week where kids could stay an extra half hour and be able to work on whatever they needed to,” Donet said.
Donet believes her project helps give these students someone they know in high school orchestra and helps them build confidence when talking to another musician about what they need to improve on.
“I have seen a lot of my students progress and more of the kids I have been teaching have continued into high school. Right now at MPSH there are five to six kids I mentored that have joined the orchestra,” Donet said.
Her communication with the students has helped her tutor these musicians in the way that best fits their learning style.
“Music and how you use your instrument is very specific of where your hand is and how you are playing. So, a lot of people get frustrated and that is part of the reason for quitting. There was a lot of making the [tutoring] digestible and making sure I am not looking down at people and just working with them,” Donet said.
Donet expresses how the most rewarding part of her project is seeing how the kids can change their perspective of music.
“Seeing the kids that have joined the orchestra and how they are now able to look at their music as something interesting rather than something you have to do is the best reward,” Donet said.
