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A normal life often seems uneventful (at least here in Russia) and there is a certain pleasure in this quietness. Not much to write about on the Web, though.
And then all of a sudden I got a very interesting invitation to spend ten days at the International School of Young Journalists. My job there was to teach the kids (and some adults too) the basics of a Web presentation, to tell about the Internet in general, to show how important it is going to be for a future journalist.
The School was organized by a unique Russian news agency, YUNPRESS, which works for the kids and has the staff mostly of teenagers (except for a very few grown-up consultants). They even have their home page on the Web, but it's completely in Russian at the moment. Still, if you (and your browser) can read Russian, do visit the YUNPRESS place.
International presence at the school was mostly European, kids from France, Greece, Germany and Ukraine came to join their Russian colleagues. One journalism teacher from California also came to share some of his views and ideas.
Brian McKenna, a teacher from California, was a celebrity of sorts at the
School. Kids loved to make an interview with him. In this photo, Anya Semenova
from YUNPRESS interrogates Brian. A short piece
she finally wrote was good enough - and showed exactly what
the students wanted to learn from an American guest.
Official opening of the School... Well, nothing was too official there!
She was one of the youngest participants. When the picture was
published in "Youth Newspaper", the caption said "The balloons will
fly away, the journalism will always stay with us!"
And these two happy writers obviously enjoy their work in the
computer room. This room was crowded all round the clock... That's why we
had a new copy of the School's daily titled The Master-Class every
morning by breakfast time.
Perhaps now some of you have learned the name of Russian space station, MIR, where an American astronaut recently set the national record of time spent in a spacecraft. The American expert is safely back home, but the MIR station and its new crew keep working up there at the orbit around our planet.
YUNPRESS will have an hour for live interview with the crew members of MIR in late September (the exact date will be known by September 15). Young journalists from YUNPRESS will ask questions - and this is where they need your help/cooperation. They would like to ask questions sent by the kids from around the world... The only limitation: they want questions which cannot be answered correctly unless the persons who answer are on the space station! That rules out piles of traditional questions like "Do you like pets?", "What does it take to become an astronaut?", and so on. But think of the questions that requires for the answer this very special location... This is the challenge! There are people up there at the space station ready to answer your question, just make it interesting.
If you come up with interesting questions, Russian kids will ask them for you (of course telling the astronauts who and from where has sent the question) - and then will send you back the answer, and perhaps later prepare the entire Web publication about the space interview... Maybe even at this very F&P server!
Please send your questions (with the comment that they are for Space Interview) directly to YUNPRESS at ynpress@glas.apc.org or to me - I will help the kids to do the network part of this project....
Thanks - and we're looking forward to get your good questions!
Andrey,
asebrant@online.ru
