Students Take on Police-Community Relations in a Video Project

Prologue Early College students spent the months of October and November brainstorming, writing, storyboarding and filming an instructional video on what to do when interacting with Chicago police officers, tentatively titled “Know Your Rights, But…”. The video came about as part of collaboration between the Video Production class taught by CTVN’s Vedran Residbegovic and Art of Communication class taught by Prologue teacher Dr. Virginia Boyle.

During our idea development sessions early in the semester, the students identified negative encounters with the police as a challenge they faced in their communities. Some of the students shared stories of being stopped and searched by the police in their neighborhoods, often for no reason other than “looking suspicious”. As part of our news literacy thrust, the students researched safe practices when dealing with law enforcement, and based the film on information published by civil rights law organizations.

The aim of our video project is three-fold:

1. To immerse Prologue students in academic activities such as idea generation, research, writing, as well as technical side of video production — operating the camera, sound recording, lighting, directing and acting, while working with subject matter that’s engaging and relevant to the students’ daily lives.

2. To allow Prologue students the time and safe space to learn how to safely and responsibly interact with the law enforcement.

3. To create an engaging finished video that will serve as an informational resource to youth audiences nation-wide.