The academy is one of more than two dozen summer camps for kids organized and run by UofL faculty, staff and students. The media camp teaches the young women how to do research, shoot video, edit and make a final video presentation while, hopefully, piquing their interest in technology.

UofL English professor Mary P. Sheridan says middle school girls “drop out of STEM fields and if that’s where the jobs of the future are we don’t want girls to start weeding themselves out of these jobs of the future.”

Others who are closer to college are the high schoolers from across the region who attended the Summer Law Institute at UofL. They heard from lawyers and judges, toured judicial buildings in downtown Louisville and participated in a mock trial – all to get a feel for the legal field and whether they want to pursue a law degree.

“The most important part of this week was talking to the judge at the federal court. We heard about his job and what he goes through, but also the changes he can make to the community,” said Greg Schwartz, a student at DuPont Manual High School. That really inspired me and helped me figure out what I want to do.” 

The day-camp students, who just completed fifth grade at three Jefferson County elementary schools, will apply their technical skills in workshops on this year’s theme, “Me in the Making.” The doctoral program in rhetoric and composition in the College of Arts and Sciences offers the free camp for students chosen from Lincoln Elementary Performing Arts School, Cochran Elementary School and J.B. Atkinson Academy for Excellence.

The campers will work on a “photovoice” project by setting up photograph scenes and then writing accompanying narratives to show through image and text what it means to be a girl in their community. The girls also will use Snapchat, collaborate on team movie projects and explore Speed Art Museum’s Art Sparks area.

Camp leaders are four UofL graduate students from diverse fields of study working with English professor Mary P. Sheridan to design, teach, operate and evaluate the camp; learn about meaningful team-teaching with technology; and later publish journal articles and share their research results. This year’s leaders are from rhetoric and composition, public health, exercise physiology and women’s and gender studies/social work.

Begun in 2014, the academy is designed to increase the girls’ problem-solving and storytelling confidence and technological competence as they learn to be producers as well as consumers. Their team-produced movies and individual photovoice projects will be shown in a public showcase that concludes the camp. Students will receive iPod Touch devices to keep; the work also is intended to help combat the oft-cited summer slide in reading and writing skills, especially in transitioning to middle school.

“There is such a huge disparity of women in the STEM fields” Olinger says, “so we see this camp partly as a matter of economic justice.”

See more from the recent Digital Media Academy in the video below: